Hidden Secrets
by CrypticMoonFang
Summary: Father won't stay, new father has serious problems, cops are onto me, new character enters, past lives are discovered, friction separates friends. I'm Raven Roth, and this is my twisted story of an unwed teenage mother.
1. The Kidnapping

-Chapter 1-

A teenage girl in a blue robe drifted past her friends. All of them had superpowers, and made no real effort to keep their identities hidden. The group of friends called themselves the Teen Titans. It was a catchy name, actually. First, there was Robin. Yep, Batman's former sidekick. He decided one day that he and Batman should part ways, and he ended up meeting Beast Boy. No one really knew Beast Boy's past. He himself never knew about his mother or father. But he knew he had strange powers. He could instantly shape shift into any known animal, and even dinosaurs! Not to mention the alien animals... Creepy! Upon his and Robin's meeting, they met Cyborg. As his name suggests, Cyborg was half human and half robot; a cyborg. However, underneath he was a good guy, who loved to hang out and chill with his best friend, Beast Boy. The two were constantly snatching victory from the other one's hands with their unrivaled video game skills. Don't worry, though! The gang doesn't just consist of boys. A strange alien princess from the planet Tamaran was the group's very first team mission. The Tamaranian, Starfire, could shoot what she called "starbolts" from her hands and eyes and can also fly simply by thinking a happy thought. Upon kissing Robin, she instantaneously acquired the English language. Later it was found that the people of her planet used this method to communicate without much trouble. And last but not least, the fifth member of the group, Raven. She was a mysterious girl, supposedly born and raised on a planet or world called Azurath. Her superpowers consist of pure energy. Using it, she can levitate and control objects thousands of times bigger than herself! Together, they made up the Titans and worked together to stop their enemies dead in their tracks.

Raven went to her room, as usual, and locked the door. She remembered her first day on Earth. Everyone thought she was weird and didn't want anything to do with her. Little kids cried when they saw her first heroic action of stopping a wayward train from crashing. The train had slid off the rails and was going to crash. She used her energy to grab the train and lift it into the air, stopping the crash and hurting none. Then she set it back on its rails, and it went on its way. But little kids got scared, and people thought she was a freak. She always knew she didn't belong here on this planet, but she stayed because of her friends. They would surely hate it if she left. But there was another reason; the people of Earth needed her, even if they didn't like her.

"Yo, Raven!" an all-too-familiar male voice shouted from behind her door. Surprise! It was Beast Boy.

"What do you want? I said I wanted to be alone." Raven dully asked. She went through this every day.

"Cyborg says that in Monster Truck Smashers 4 the lower your points are, the less damage you took and therefore the one with the lowest points wins. But that's not true! I say the more points you have the better you're doing! Tell Cyborg he's wrong!" Beast Boy demanded.

"And...why do I have to get involved again?" she wondered out loud.

"I'm telling you, BB! The lower your score, the better you are! I'm the one winning!" Cyborg's voice was heard in the background.

"No you aren't! It depends on what Raven says!" Beast Boy yelled back. He turned back to Raven, begging her to tell Cyborg he was wrong.

"Hold on a second." she said. In her room, she flipped a coin. Heads was Beast Boy and tails was Cyborg. It was how she'd always dealt with them, and it worked every time. The coin landed on heads. She blinked, walked back to Beast Boy, and said, "Congratulations, you're right. Go knock yourself out."

Beast Boy jumped up in the air. "Yeah! Woo! I knew I was right!" he screamed. He dashed back to the losing Cyborg.

After making sure he was gone, Raven pulled her door closed again. Seconds later, you-know-who was back. She pulled open her door again, asking what he wanted this time.

"Wanna play with us?" Beast Boy asked.

"...No." she answered. "Why don't you ask Robin or Starfire?"

"'Cause Robin's downstairs training and Starfire can't play video games to save her life." he replied.

"I heard she was bored. If you don't want alien good-luck pudding for dinner, you better let her play with you." she warned. Starfire's alien pudding was the most aweful thing you've ever tasted in your life. Realizing this, Beast Boy ran to Starfire's room and frantically banged on her door. "Star!" he said, "Star! Play a game with us!"

Raven shut her door again and, as luck would have it, she heard knocks on her door again. Beast Boy was back. Again.

"She won't play unless you do. Please Raven! Save us from the pudding!" he begged.

Raven sighed, knowing she'd be sucked into doing it anyway. "Fine, I'll play." she gave.

Four of the five were on the couch and soon enough, Raven won the game.

"Woah! Hey, no fair! You cheated! You used those strange powers of yours to predict stuff! You were anticipating our moves!" Beast Boy accused.

"I can't predict anything." she stated plainly. "I'll be in my room if anyone needs me." Which in this instance, they probably would. She did just what she said she would do. She went to her room.

"Aw! C'mon, Raven! I was kidding! Why are you so boring..." Beast Boy yelled, still mad he got thrashed by a girl.

Boring, was it? Raven looked down. So now she was boring, huh? First it was weird, now it was boring, what next? Beast Boy was like a little brother to her. She didn't want him gone, but he still annoyed the crap out of her! And now she was boring...

A loud crash was heard right behind her. Several items in her room were thrown in the opposite direction. Even before Raven could look to see who had invaded her bedroom, a needle was stuck in her neck. The last thing she saw was Beast Boy, Cyborg, and Starfire bursting into the room. After that, everything went dark.

Robin was the very next one to enter the wrecked space. "What happened?" he asked.

"Raven's gone! We don't know what happened to her!" Cyborg answered.

"What? How can you not know?" an angry Robin persisted.

"It all happened so fast... First, I hear a loud crash, then I come into the room just in time to see Raven being carried off. I didn't get a glimpse of the person who did it, but I remember getting a glimpse of Raven. She looked like she was unconscious." Beast Boy continued.

"I do not believe I got to see Raven before she was abducted." Starfire confirmed.

"All of your stories only lead to one thing. We don't know anything about this guy. We don't even know where Raven is. Beast Boy, are you sure she was unconscious?" Robin asked, just to be sure.

"Yeah. Maybe the guy who took her drugged her?" he asked.

"Drugged? No. Drugs usually take at least a few minutes to work." he cleared up.

"Perhaps Raven went of her own will." Starfire suggested.

"Willingly? What are you talking about, Star?" Cyborg asked.

"I mean, perhaps she has a secret friend we do not know about. If that is the situation, then there is no need for panic." she said.

"Star's got a good point. But then why'd she look unconscious?" Beast Boy asked.

"There's another good point. If Raven had a secret friend, she wouldn't be unconscious when they came to pick her up. Raven was kidnapped." Robin said.

"Well, _obviously_! But how're we ever gonna find her? The guy's got guts and brute strength! If he had something that could take down Raven in one move, how do we know he don't have some kinda cloaking device?" Cyborg implied.

"Well, I'm not taking that chance. If Raven's communicator is still on, then I bet I can track her signal." Robin suggested. "But I'm gonna need really hard technology to do that, considering she could be anywhere by now." He cast a quick glance at Cyborg.

Getting the hint, Cyborg answered, "I got some new stuff in my room. I don't know if it can help, but-"

"It's good enough. If it doesn't work, we'll have to try the regular tracker." he interrupted.

Starfire looked down on Raven's bed and found something that would kill their hopes of finding her. She picked up a small gadget with a black screen and a snub of an antenna. It was still on, but had a weak battery due to the fact that it was slightly crushed. Everyone immediately noticed it. It was Raven's communicator.

* * *

Hours had passed. There had been several arguments over how to find Raven without her tracker. It was almost dusk and they still hadn't found so much as a trace as to where she was. She hadn't come back, obviously. They'd tried to find DNA traces of her kidnapper in her room, but they'd found nothing. Raven had always been a mysterious girl, and if she wanted to get away, she could very easily do just that. But this was too weird. She'd been kidnapped unwillingly. There was no trace of her abductor. She still wasn't back. And no clues that _were_ found led anywhere in their frantic search.

* * *

Another hour later, a loud boom caught the entire group's attention. Since it came from Raven's room, they were naturally led to that destination. There was a lot of dust and dirt, but no Raven. Suddenly, booms were being set off all over the tower! Something or someone was attacking them.

The last boom they heard was somewhere in the basement. The group burst through the basement doors and cautiously began searching the room for the intruder. Still more dust and dirt wafting throughout the basement, but there was no other physical form besides themselves. Beast Boy decided this chase was just play, and not a real threat at all. He shifted into a bloodhound and started sifting through many scents, trying to locate any unfamiliar scents. But once he got to the training area of the basement, he stopped dead in his tracks.

The group soon found themselves running towards Beast Boy's incessant barking.

Once he was sure the whole group was alerted, he changed back into a human. Normally a prankster, it went against his nature to be very serious.

Raven was back, and still unconscious.


	2. Sick Much?

-Chapter 2-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

My eyes open, and the first thing I see is my friends, gathered around me. I understand everything that had happened to me. And it's actually a much bigger deal than it looked. And it looked like a pretty big deal. But I'd already made the decision to keep what happened a secret. That's right; I know nothing.

"Raven, what happened? Where were you? Who did it?" the barrage of questions begins.

"I don't know." I lie, acid dripping from every word. "I don't know anything. I just woke up here. What happened?"

"You were kidnapped!" Robin tells me.

I continue to feign innocence, "I was? How?"

Beast Boy immediately steps up and tells me about the explosion in my room, and how they didn't know who took me. He tells me they tried to find me, but couldn't because I left my communicator in my room.

"Sorry. I didn't think I'd need it anytime soon." I lie. That darn thing had _fallen_ off during the dramatic entrance, I hadn't intentionally left it there.

"But it is fine now, yes?" Starfire joins, "Raven is well, and that is all that matters." Then she turns her attention to me. "We are all delighted to have you back with us!"

"Thanks." I know I'm not good at being the happiest, funnest person in the whole world, but how could anyone be happy at a time like this? All I wanted was to be alone. I didn't want to give away too much information, after all.

I ascend to the ceiling using levitation, and I proceed to open a portal to the top of Titans' Tower. But then something goes wrong. The portal has bad energy invested in it, and it literally shatters. I get cut up a bit, but I'm otherwise unharmed. That is the very first time anything has ever gone wrong with my powers. Not even I can explain the reason, even though I do have an idea.

I sigh. It looks like I'm using the stairs.

"Raven, what just happened?" I hear someone's stunned voice ask.

"I don't know. I'll look into it later." I say. It's half-true. I'm from a completely different planet, where even babies can learn to use their powers. So powers malfunctioning are not just rare, but only spoken of in ancient legends and horror movies. But it can also signal one other thing, though it's rare if it does. Sickness is very rarely, but possibly, a cause. So that's two things that I could have wrong with me. Illness, and that one other thing I was just talking about.

You may be wondering why I refuse to tell my friends what I'm thinking. It's because it could put them in danger. If anything happened to them...I wouldn't be able to live with myself. They were family to me. They took me in, gave me a place to call home. How can I betray them by putting their lives at stake?

* * *

Two months passed, and everything returned to normal. My door is being broken down because Beast Boy gets way too into his games. The world is a confusing place, and I'm constantly confused as to why _I'm_ the one who gets roped into this trivial stuff.

But today is different. Last night, I woke up in the middle of the night feeling like I was gonna puke. You know what? I went to the bathroom and found myself hanging over the toilet for half an hour! But last night isn't the end of it. Even now, I feel more tired than I did the time I stayed up for two nights straight. Sound weird? Well, then check this: my powers still aren't functioning right. For some reason, and I still haven't told anyone, I'm losing control over them!

"Raven, you look very tired. Are you feeling well?" Starfire asks me.

"Swell." I answer.

"But you do not look 'swell'." she persists.

Now, Starfire may not know this, but on Earth, when someone tells you you looks tired, they're just being kind. 'You look tired' is the nice way to say you look like crap. So one can just imagine how I feel when someone says, "You look tired." Those jerks... However, I don't think Starfire understands the phrase's true meaning. She's an alien, after all, and even though she's been on Earth for awhile now, she still doesn't understand the true concept of most of Earth's words and phrases. So in alot of ways, she uses them very loosely. That said, I might want to warn you that she thinks an elephant is a bird because she Dumbo. And she's also very wary around new electronic objects because she saw I-Robot. She now insists that the microwave is planning a rebellion against all of mankind, and that we should evacuate the earth unless Will Smith comes to save us.

"I'm fine." I tell her.

"Are you sure? Something seems different about you..." She trails off, as though she just can't place her finger on it.

"Starfi-oh God!" I run back to the bathroom to empty my stomach again. It seems Starfire heard the splattering sound because she ends up asking me what's wrong. This girl truly has no boundaries... I have to explain to her that when a person gets sick, often the side effects include barfing and a fever. But it's weird because I'm explaining this to her while on the other side of the bathroom door.

After ten minutes I come out. My stomach feels almost as if it's on fire. I'm not quite in the mood for a conversation, but Starfire is glowing with happiness.

"How do you check to see if you have the fever?" she asks with good intentions.

"You get a thermometer and put it in my mouth. When it beeps you check the number on the screen. If it's ninety-five to ninety-eight then I'm fine. If it's ninety-nine or higher then I'm sick." I say. She'll be pestering me later if I don't tell her now.

It doesn't take long for Starfire to rush to and fro. The next thing I know, I'm laying down with a thermometer shoved forcefully into my mouth. I put it under my tongue, eager myself to see what the results are. If I'm sick, then I have nothing to fear, but if I'm not sick, then I won't know what to think.

Even before the first 'beep' is over, Starfire snatches the stick and yanks it out of my mouth. "Joy!" she shouts, "You are not ill! Your temperature is ninety seven dot five!"

"Yeah... Joy..." I say. Such is my relationship with Starfire. She's happy and girly, and I'm...Raven. Weird combination, the two of us, but we're close friends.

Before anyone's thoughts were finished, the alarms sound. That reminds me that I don't have time for napping or lazing about when a villain is attacking the city. I push through my fatigue and prepare for yet another battle. It's then that Robin comes in the living room where me and Starfire are at and announces that Cinderblock is attacking the city, searching for diamonds. Why would Cinderblock be searching for diamonds? Who knows? Perhaps Slade figured he needed big jewelry to go with his big ego.

Everyone, including Beast Boy, rushes out the doors. Robin rides his always-trusty motorcycle, Beast Boy transforms into a red-tailed hawk, I ride on levitation, Starfire flies, and Cyborg rides in his car. Man, I would really love to hitch a ride right about now. But again, I can't show that I'm not okay. The whole group thinks the incident that took place two months ago is over, and I plan to keep it that way. Unfortunately, I can't help but feel a twinge of pain in my lower abdomen. It's not a bathroom kind of pain, but I can't really describe it. It's coming in waves, making it impossible to stretch out my whole body.

* * *

By the time we get to where Cinderblock is, the pain has subsided. I stretch and then stretch again. Then I yawn, my fatigue hitting me like a ton of bricks. I feel myself flying lower and lower. I don't worry, though; I'm still pretty high up in the air.

I realized soon enough, though, that I'm the only one _not_ fighting Cinderblock. I'm still high in the air, and then I realize why. My whole world is getting hazy, and my levitation is messing up. I feel my powers weaken to an astonishingly low level. I can't push myself forward by using levitation. And worse still, my powers aren't done draining. I let the hood of my blue robe fall back, revealing my face and hair. I soon feel gravity tugging at my body. My levitation is wearing thin, but there isn't anything I can do about it. I start to swing back and forth, much like a pendulum. My levitation is nearly gone, but that isn't the reason behind my swinging. I'm dizzy. So dizzy that my vision shows everything as moving. I feel like I'm gonna pass out.

Beast Boy is the first to notice my problem. He sees my abnormal flight patterns and suspects something is wrong with me.

After a few more dizzy and off-balance swings, I can't comprehend what is what. I don't know if I'm moving or staying still, and I don't know which way is up and which way is down. All I know is that I'm rocketing one of the two ways. But I'm swimming in confusion and I'm too confused to realize that I'm in danger. I don't even realize I'm confused! What I'm failing to realize is that I'm plummeting earthward. I'm not unconscious, but I can't see anything right! The whole world is swirling and spinning... I don't know what to think. I don't know if I _should_ think.

Beast Boy shifts from a rhinoceros to a pterodactyl and swiftly flies to my rescue, catching me in midair. He's shocked at my strange behavior today.

I grumble something in my stupor but not even I know what it is I'm grumbling, or what I'm grumbling about. In fact, I'm not even sure I'm grumbling real words. I think all I'm doing is making weird noises, because Beast Boy lands and morphs back into a human. I hear him ask me what happened back there, but I don't have the slightest clue what he's saying. English is suddenly a foreign language to me. Instead of giving out a real answer, I just moan and make a few more strange noises.

Beast Boy knows he can't warn the others about this just yet. They're busy fighting Cinderblock. So Beast Boy decides that until they're done, he'll stay and tend to me. His first act of business is to hold up three fingers and ask me how many finger he's holding up.

Like I know! I can't even recognize Beast Boy right now, how am I supposed to know how many fingers he's holding up? I can't even recognize what he asked me! He just sounds like, "Ramnoo, row any bigern ah ay moadin uh?" How the crap am I supposed to translate that into English when I'm like this? All I can do is make a few more noises to tell him I'm alive. I'm sure being alive counts for something, right? But all I want to do right now is go to sleep. I just want the problems of the world to slide off my shoulders for once. Everything starts going dark, and I do absolutely nothing to stop the darkness. I want it to be there, to comfort me.

"Raven? RAVEN!" Beast Boy yells to the top of his lungs. He has no idea what's going on with me. He just sees my eyes slowly closing, and wants me to stay conscious at least until the others are able to get to me. But yelling at me isn't helping, as he is slow to figure out. He lifts the upper half of my body up in another effort to keep me awake.

After screaming at me some more, Beast Boy finally succeeds in catching everyone else's attention. They rush over to my aid, not caring about Cinderblock anymore. If I knew what was happening, I would be glad that they thought of me as more important than Cinderblock.

"What's wrong with her?" Robin asks, referring to my pitiful state.

Beast Boy quickly answers, shaking me vigorously as he does. Another well-aimed effort to keep me awake. It's working for the time being. "I have no idea! I noticed she wasn't fighting and so I turned around, to see if she was just slow. I saw her suddenly drop from the sky and I had to catch her. When I landed, I asked her how many fingers I was holding up. But she didn't respond, she only made weird noises. She's hardly moved since I caught her and she doesn't seem to be able to talk anymore! And now she's falling asleep! What do I do?"

Robin doesn't answer him. Instead, he takes everything into account. Everyone else tries to keep me awake, but soon none of their tricks will work anymore. I can feel my mind gradually going blank. Robin, after mulling everything over, turns to me and starts asking questions.

"What is your name?" I can't respond to that. I just want to sleep, but everyone keeps yelling and moving me around, doing everything they can to keep me from sleeping. So I just grunt tiredly.

"How old are you?" Again, I just grunt.

"Do you know where you are, Raven?" Honestly, I have no idea where I am. I have no idea who Robin is, and everything is still darkening. But this time I don't answer at all. I simply don't have the energy. Everyone starts shaking me and screaming at me again, but now I'm desensitized to it all. I hardly heard anyone's voices, and I hardly felt anyone shaking me. I'm happy to finally be able to drift off into a dreamless slumber.

"No! Raven, don't! Stay with us!" Cyborg yells, knowing it's too late.


	3. Diagnosis

-Chapter 3-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

I wake up again. I'm on the medical care bed, again. Many different monitors show my body's vital signs. It's then that I realize I'm levitating, separate of my will. Now I think I know what's happening to me. Why my powers are malfunctioning, why I felt pain in my stomach and severe nausea, and why I got so dizzy I couldn't even move. It all ties together. At long last I have a pretty good idea of what might be wrong with me.

I get off the medical bed, and without a single word, I make my way to my room. I need to look something up.

Once I close myself off in my room, I make sure the door is locked. Nobody can see if the problem is what I think it is. I know I can't use my powers, so I begin searching through hundreds of books by hand. Ah, here it is. I pick up an old, dusty book. Never once have I read it before now. I furiously begin turning pages, trying to identify the cause of my body's strange behavior.

I'm rudely interrupted by a knock on my door. "Yes?" I say without opening the door.

"It's me, Cyborg. We don't know quite how to tell you this, but we don't know what wrong with you. I swear, we've tried everything!" Cyborg says.

"It's alright. I think I know what it is. I'll tell you when the time is right." I reply.

"But, Raven! We have to know _now_ so we can fix it!" he persists.

"You don't need to worry about that. I can fix it." I tell him. I know he's baffled at the answer, but for now, I'm the only one who should know.

Ah-hah! The section I'm looking for! I read it inside my head.

"Symptoms: nausea/tightness in abdominal area/vomiting...

Diagnosis:"

I'm expecting the diagnosis to be anything but what I read. I'm thinking it's too much stress and the cure is a long rest. Boy, does that piece of paper show me! I literally can't take it and throw the book across my room; it hits a shelf and knocks it over, casing many items and books to come crashing down. I don't care. I don't care about the mess or the ruckus. My so-called 'diagnosis' can't be right! There's just no way! I'm from Azurath, so it's next to impossible, right? There's no way that cursed book can be true!

While I'm sitting in the floor crying about this unexpected turn of events, I don't even realize everyone is trying to get my door open to see what the noise was. But they don't really need to try. My emotions are running higher than ever and I can swear I hear voices taunting me inside my head. I cover my ears in a futile attempt to quell the voices that were telling me it was all my fault. I'm feeling scared, helpless, and lost. I sit there, wide-eyed and a full spectrum of emotions.

In my daze, my powers activate according to my emotions. My door is grabbed with dark energy and thrust out of my room. Several other items, including the little book that just now ruined my life, are thrown out the same way.

Beast Boy and Robin are trying to get into my room to calm me down while at the same time dodging a barrage of random objects. They can hardly see my crumpled figure through the many items obscuring me.

I probably am doing this partly of my own will. I don't want them to see me like this, and at the same time I have this urge to tell them everything. I need to know they'll still be my friends and help me through this; I need to know I'm still accepted. But right now, I need to be isolated from all of them. The part that isn't of my own will is the part where I can't keep my emotions down any longer. I can't keep them locked up any more. I'm way beyond the threshold of pain now.

I take a swift glance at Robin and Beast Boy. They are happy. Worried right now, but happy overall. But I can't use them to help me out on this issue. They aren't ready to be committed to something so hard. I have to do this on my own. It's my responsibility, not anyone else's. Now I have to be strong.

One of the few items remaining is a meditation mirror that Beast Boy had once gotten himself trapped in. It's a portal into my mind. Inside it are several different Ravens, each representing one of my emotions. They can help me, because they are me! I lunge at the mirror. Upon picking it up, the mirror activates. I put up no struggle as the mirror sucks me into my own mind.

Beast Boy and Robin are finally free of the raging objects. Books that were previously in the air drop with a thud. Strings and wires that were previously in the air now dangle from the ceiling and from other items. My door is covered in books and slightly hidden by a bookshelf. Inside my room is no better. There are holes and cracks in the walls. Some of the carpet is ripped, other parts of it are shredded. My ceiling fan is on the floor; its lights broken, its blades beaten and battered. Pages from various books are still floating and fluttering and covering the room. My meditation mirror is one of the few things that's unbroken.

Robin is the first to stumble in. "Where'd she run off to?" he asks himself.

Beast Boy looks around a bit before figuring it out. "I know where she went. Follow me." With those words, he picks up the mirror. Sure enough, it activates, and Beast Boy is sucked into my dimension. Robin doesn't hesitate to follow.

In mere moments, they are both looking at a tormented place. Already-dead trees are on fire. A fire that never ends. Black birds with four red eyes fly over the wrecked landscape. There is no grass or bright color. The land here is barren and deserted. My happy counterpart is the first to greet them.

"R-Raven? Are you wearing _pink_?" Robin asks.

She giggles and says, "Duh! Pink is my favorite color! Hehehe!"

"It is?" he whispers in shock.

"Robin, that's not Raven. You'll know the real Raven because she'll be wearing blue and black. There are alot of these fake Ravens here, so don't be fooled." Beast Boy informs.

"Why are there fake Ravens to begin with?" he asks.

"Because the mirror we got sucked into isn't any ordinary mirror. It's a portal into Raven's mind. These Ravens are just her emotions. They aren't the real one, they just represent different sides of her." he explains.

"Oh. But if this is Raven's mind, then I have to say I never want to come back here." Robin comments.

"It's not really like this. I think Raven's really upset about something. That's probably why everything is so bad." Beast Boy tells him.

My happy counterpart is listening to it all. She seems slightly disturbed. "Well, you're right about one thing. The world here has changed alot... Raven came here because she's extremely, almost indescribably upset about something. She doesn't want any of us to tell you, so we can't. Raven controls us, so you really won't get much information out of me or any of the other Ravens. I can tell you where she went, but I warn you, she's in a really delicate emotional state right now. Don't push her too far, okay?"

"Where'd she go?" Robin asks.

The happy Raven points to a foggy maze. "She went into that maze; she's probably out of it by now, though. She knows that maze like the back of her hand."

Beast Boy furrows his eyebrows. "Yeah, well I know that maze, too. I'm pretty sure I remember the directions to the end."

Both of the two run to the maze. Afraid he'll lose Robin inside it, Beast Boy changes into a stallion and circles Robin, his body language telling Robin to get on his back. Robin mounts Beast Boy and allows him to lead the way. After all, he's been in this same maze before and learned the way out. Robin has no idea of the way out.

I'm already outside of the maze. With almost nowhere else to go and hide, I have no choice but to wait for them to come get me. I know Beast Boy will be able to make it through that maze easily. He'd been in it before. Robin is most likely going to travel with him. They've come to get me even though I don't want them to. They're true friends.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, my thoughts were confirmed. Beast Boy emerged from the maze as a horse. It doesn't take long before he changes back into a human. The very first thing they see is my backside. I'm staring at the portal. My hood is up at an angle to where it hides my face. However, the boys don't care if I'm emotionally unstable or not. They dash up to me and immediately start hounding me with questions.

"Raven, what's gotten into you? Why did you suddenly leave like that? Why were you throwing things at us? Why did you come here? What are you thinking?"

I've just crossed into the minefield... These questions are aimed directly at me. They're meant to make me think long and hard about what I've done, but all they're doing is making things worse. I feel my throat constrict. Already I can feel my dreaded emotions flooding out my eyes.

"Raven, we came here to take you back with us. We want to find out what's wrong with you." Robin commanded.

I can't hold back anymore. I literally drop to the ground and start shaking and sobbing.

A feeling of guilt comes over the two and they quickly apologize. But it's too late. I can't help myself, and I know I have to tell them some of the truth, if not all of it. "I-It's not my fault... I didn't mean to... And now... I can't u-undo it..."

"What's not your fault? What can't you undo?" they ask.

My throat feels as though a python wrapped itself around it. I can't speak. Instead, I continue to sob.

"Raven, are you okay?" Beast Boy tenderly asks, so as not upset me more, if that's even possible right now. He's never seen me like this before, and I know it has to be a hard sight to take in. But I can't answer him. Part of it is because I don't want to, and part of it is because I'm too choked up to talk to anyone.

The voices in my head begin taunting me again, torturing my very soul with their words. I cover my ears again, trying to make them go away. I can't. They're right... The book is truthful.

I, Raven, am pregnant.


	4. Lies, All Lies

-Chapter 4-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

Robin and Beast Boy each put a hand on either of my shoulders. I'm distraught right now. I can't think straight. All I'm thinking about is the baby. I don't know if it's a boy or girl yet. I don't know how to be nurturing, and there's a high possibility that I can die! But what worries me more is the fact that I have no idea how to be a mother. What am I supposed to do? I don't even know how to change a diaper!

Tons upon tons of thoughts keep running through my mind, until my mind is just a jumbled-up mess. In turn, this caused the dimension in my mind to change into an unpleasant scape. I decide not to linger on this one problem, which just so happens to be a huge problem, and to get everyone out of my mind-dimension.

* * *

Back in my room, we all have to face the wrath of a worried Starfire. Robin is hopeless... He won't stand up to Starfire because he's got a major crush on her. But Starfire's too oblivious to see it, even though it's pretty obvious. If you ask me, I think Starfire's got a big crush on Robin, too. But, hey, the world is a weird and probably bitter place. I say bitter because just look at what destiny did to _me_. I'm gonna be a single mother!

I replay that though in my head. Every time hurts worse than the next. I'm gonna be a single mother. I'm gonna be a single mother. I'm gonna be a single mother. No matter how often I replay it, my heart rips into a thousand pieces. I actually hate the father of this child. I hate him with a vengeance. It's hard to love an unborn child when its father is flat-out evil. This kid's father kidnapped me! Yeah, that's right... I _told_ you I knew what happened when I was abducted. That's why it took me so long to come back to the Titans' Tower.

"Raven, you seem a bit...distant. Oh! Is this a new form of your meditation?" Starfire innocently asks.

"Uh, yeah, Starfire. I'm just meditating is all." I reply.

"Actually, Raven, Star's right. What's on your mind?" Beast Boy added.

In all honesty, I want everyone to know about this whole fiasco. But I find it better not to tell them. I'm afraid if I do, they won't stand by me. But then how will I cover up this mess when my stomach starts growing steadily larger? I don't know... I just learned today, so I've got plenty of time. My gestation period, taking into account that I'm from Azurath, is one whole year. Twelve months. A person who's from Earth has a gestation period of nine months. However, I still have the same side effects as a human. Except mine are more extreme. And during the middle of the pregnancy, things start changing. Alot.

* * *

Four months have passed. A month earlier, I began eating ten pounds a day. Not really ten pounds but it sure feels like it. Now, I'm gaining weight like crazy and eating foods I never thought possible. A good example would be the pickle and caramel sandwich I had yesterday. Yes, I know it sounds gross. That's what everyone else thought, too. But me? I licked the plate clean! Best sandwich ever! Though I'd only recommend it for pregnant women only.

Nobody knows I'm pregnant. My crazy eating habits are leading them to believe I'm just growing fat instead of pregnant. Even Starfire, the pacifist, stares at me with such wonder in her eyes. But even she hates the stuff I eat. She just can't stomach a pickle-caramel sandwich. She knows. She's tried. And worse, I've actually grown to love her alien pudding. I'm constantly asking her to make me some. This is another thing that draws unwanted attention to myself.

And here's another thing! I heard pregnant women are lazier than normal because they have to conserve energy and weight. Well, I've just recently given a whole new meaning to that. I sleep most of the day, and become slightly more active at night. But it doesn't take long; about an hour, actually, for me to tire out again. Then I sleep, again, and wake up about three hours later. In the day I can stay up for about forty or fifty minutes, then it's right back to bed or the sofa. It's a good thing I don't snore in my sleep, otherwise they'd have to kick me out of the house!

Anyway, my point is: being pregnant sucks.

My stomach intrudes in any thought that may still be lingering. It's growling and snarling at me. Time to eat for the millionth time today... I'm swift to grab a bag of sour cream and onion potato chips and start snacking away on them. These chips are probably the only normal craving I ever have. Speaking of cravings, you know what they say about them? They say the cravings you have during pregnancy contain some kind of vitamin or mineral the baby needs.

After I'm done munching on my chips, and let me assure you half the bag is gone, it hits me. I made a promise to the father I would return to him to show him the baby's doing well at six months along. Like I said, the father is downright evil, so I waste no time in hustling out the door, trying my best to avoid suspicion.

Little do I know Beast Boy is watching me. He's literally a fly on the wall, and I fail to see him. He slyly and almost noiselessly follows me, eager to see where I'm going.

It doesn't take me long to get to the city; it's right by the Titans' Tower. It's where I go in the city that shocks Beast Boy. I end up at an old abandoned pretzel factory. Now, you're probably wondering why it's here that I choose to meet my child's father. Well, for one, I want to avoid any unnecessary suspicion, and two, it wasn't even my idea to meet him here. But, knowing the dad, I knew he'd choose a creepy place like this. So I put up no argument and just went along with what he decided.

"Ah, so you remembered, Raven? So nice of you to come." a man's deep voice said.

"It's not really my decision, now is it?" I spit.

"Now, now, Raven... It's not good for the baby to hear this kind of friction between its parents." he says.

"Don't rub the baby in my face! This is all your fault! I didn't even want the baby, remember?" I scream at him.

It's then that Beast Boy enters the room I'm in. Being a fly, he has a short attention span and got slightly off-course. But he found his way back and now here he is. He clings to the side of a wall using tiny hooked feet that grip the small scratches made by the paintbrush when the place was painted. He sits and listens to the conversation.

"Raven, Raven, Raven... And here I thought I'd receive a hug." the man continues.

"And why's that?" I ask partly out of curiosity.

"Well," the man steps out from behind the shadows where he loves to lurk and hugs me from behind, "I _am_ your first, after all. I think I should get credit for that much, don't you?"

Beast Boy's eyes widen to the size of two large grapes and he immediately has heard enough. He flies silently and stunned out of the room and the building altogether.

"You're not really my first, Slade." I tell him as I slip out of his gripping hug.

"On the contrary, dear Raven. You chose this yourself. Don't blame me for your choices." he reminds me.

"Getting to the real point, how is my child faring? Well, I presume?" he asks in mock politeness.

"_Our_ child is just fine. Using my spleen as a punching bag, but fine." I reply with absolutely no sarcasm in my tone. I'm dead serious.

"Indeed it is. Is it too soon to tell what its gender is?" he asks.

"I don't know. Azurans don't know the gender until the baby's born."

"Well, look at the bright side, dear. you only have three more weeks left to go." I know I see an evil smile creep across his face when he says this.

"Wrong again, Slade. Azurans have a gestation period of twelve months. Get your facts right." I lash at him.

"Ah. I see. I don't mind waiting as long as you don't mess up this pregnancy. I know how hard it is for Azurans to get pregnant. There's only a .01 percent chance they can get pregnant to begin with, right?"

"Yeah. We Azurans don't usually get pregnant. That's why I was so shocked when I found out I was. Most Azuran women never get pregnant once in their lives. Azurath is the least fertile planet known throughout all the planets in space. You should've chosen a girl from Tamaran. They're the most fertile planet." I say.

"Ah, but Tamaranians don't possess the kind of amazing powers you do. It's why I chose you." he says. He chuckles lightly under his breath. An evil chuckle that means nothing but trouble. "Anyway, you're free to go now. You've answered all my questions. And besides, I don't need to put any excess stress on you or the baby."

I'm out in two seconds. Like I want to spend my free time in Slade's evil presence. Remember when I said I hate the father? Well now you know why.


	5. Worst Day of My Life

-Chapter 5-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

I finally got back to the Titans' Tower. And the first thing they asked me was unbelievable.

"Raven! Is it true?" Cyborg asked.

I couldn't help but wondering what he was talking about, so I asked, "Is...what true?"

"Did you have an affair with Slade?" Robin yelled, hushing the whole room instantly.

I began to sweat. Panic was taking over as my brain registered the question. I didn't know what to say. I supposed it was true that I had an affair with him, but it was hardly an option! When they thought Slade's probes were out of their bloodstream, everything returned to normal. But the probes weren't really gone. Slade erased them only from me so I'd be safe with the baby. But they still had them. Slade had just cloaked them. After that he kidnapped me. When I came to, I found myself in his abandoned pretzel factory. He told me about the probes inside my friends' bodies and gave me a needle with some kind of serum in it. He told me the serum would make me 'hot' and want to do 'things' I normally wouldn't want to do. He said he wasn't _that_ evil and gave me two choices: either inject myself with the serum or allow the probes to destroy my friends. It was the same trick he'd pulled on Robin. Hoping I was choosing the right thing to do, I stuck the needle in my arm. In around ten minutes, sure enough, I was...doing shameful things. The serum didn't wear off until hours later, in which all damage had been done. Then I was returned to Titans' Tower.

"I...I...I-I can't really-" I started.

Robin was quick to interrupt me, "So it's true?"

"Wait, Robin." Cyborg stopped him. Then he turned to me. "Were you forced, Raven?"

How did they know all this stuff? I frantically looked around the room before taking a deep breath and regaining my calm demeanor. I knew it was all over. I needed to tell the truth now; I'd been hiding this for too long.

"I wasn't exactly forced...per say. I had a choice-"

Again, Robin interrupted me, "So you had a willing affair with my arch nemesis. Am I wrong?"

"W-Well, I don't know if I'd call it willing-"

"Then what would you call it? Huh, Raven? You just said it was your choice, and that you weren't forced!" Robin yelled.

"I-I don't know! It's a long story, and it's really complicated! I-"

"So then you willingly had an affair with Slade, the evilest villain of them all. Not to mention the Titans' sworn enemy! How is that complicated, Raven?" he continued to scream.

"Y-Yes." I answered reluctantly.

"So what's next, Raven? I suppose you're pregnant?" Robin fumed.

My face went pale. "H-H-How did you find out...? I never told anyone..." I whispered.

"WHAT? You're actually pregnant? WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL US THIS?" he continued to storm.

"Y-You mean you _didn't_ know?" I choked out.

"How far along are you, Raven?" Beast Boy softly asked me. He seemed to be the only calm one around here.

"...Six months." I said as quietly as I could, almost hoping nobody heard me.

"Six _months_? You've been keeping that a secret for six _months_?" Cyborg groaned in shock.

"B-But-"

"No! Raven, I've heard all I need to hear. If you want to go and be Slade's little _slut_, then by all means!" With those parting words, Robin, still fuming, stormed out of the room and into his own.

I didn't know how to respond to that. Slade's little slut? Was that what everyone was thinking of me as? My throat twisted into a knot and my eyes flooded with unshed tears. As of now, I knew I was appointed as Slade's little slut. What a wonderful thought... And at six months pregnant, one of my friends just abandoned me. Left me all alone... I turned back to the rest of my friends, seeing if they would turn their backs to me just like Robin had.

Starfire, the one who'd been completely silent, finally spoke up. "In my culture, anyone who becomes pregnant out of wedlock must be shunned. I am truly sorry, friend Raven..." And then she flew right over me, into her her room to sulk about having to shun me.

Cyborg was next. He was always the type to follow others instead of lead, so naturally he was with Starfire and Robin. "Sorry, Raven." was all he said before he, too, walked out.

I then turned to Beast Boy. For only about a nanosecond, I locked eyes with him. But then I couldn't take it anymore. It was too much rejection for one day. Too much rejection for one _girl_. I pivoted on my heels and ran to pack up my things. I couldn't stay here anymore. What Robin had done was just the equivalent of kicking me out. What was the point of staying if I'd just be shunned by everyone I thought of as family? What's worse is that not one of them even cared about how hard this was on me.

It didn't take long to gather my stuff and pack them away. I was going to travel lightly until I could find a home somewhere far, far away from here. Then I could settle down and start raising my new family. I could forget about ever being a superheroine, I could forget about Slade, I could forget about this day ever happening, I could forget about the Titans.

I pushed past Beast Boy and headed on my way.

* * *

Beast Boy angrily busted down Robin's door after he refused to open it. As expected, Robin was sitting on his bed, still furious.

"How could you say that stuff to her?" Beast Boy asked.

Robin didn't answer, and Beast Boy didn't expect him to. So instead of waiting for Robin's reply, Beast Boy began telling Robin about his thoughts on the subject.

"Yeah, I know she had an affair with Slade. Yeah, I know she's pregnant with his child! But you know what? Pregnant or not, Raven is still Raven. She hasn't changed!" he raged, "And you have no right to call her Slade's slut! She's not a slut at all!"

"She is if she's with Slade! If you ask me, she deserved everything I said! She had it coming, Beast Boy!" Robin shot back.

Beast Boy sighed, knowing that yelling at him wouldn't get him to change his mind and at least apologize. "Look, Robin, I know you're mad about this. In fact, we're all a little disappointed in her. She screwed up. She knows it. But try to look at this from Raven's perspective. She's out there all alone. She's probably lost, and doesn't know what to do. How much you wanna bet she doesn't even know how to handle raising a kid all on her own? Imagine what she's gotta be feeling right now. She's gotta be torn up inside. Slade hurt her in a way that we can't even come close to understanding. And yet she's got to experience all this in such a short time frame. No, you know what, I'm not going to be nice anymore! Maybe you should think about how Raven feels for just once in your _life_!" He took a deep breath before continuing, "You know what else? I've been mean to her before, and I annoy her just about every day. But one thing I've never done is turn my back on her. And I'm not about to start now. I quit the Teen Titans!"

* * *

I was walking into a nearby wooded area, just to isolate myself from others, when I see many large dark-gray storm clouds approaching. The perfect weather for the mood I was in.

It wasn't not long before rain starts pouring down on me. I was getting drenched. My clothes were sopping wet and the rain just kept coming. It was relentless. Mercilessly, it grew heavier and heavier. And larger I might add. Until finally I was being pounded by it. And as though that wasn't enough, it soon started hailing cats and dogs! The ice was the size of marbles! It kept hurting me as it bumped onto and off of my head. Could the universe be any more cruel? Apparently so... The weather got so bad I couldn't see anything two feet in front of me!

And then, finally, it stopped. I cautiously looked up to find a Tyrannosaurus Rex's large, oversized head shielding me from the rain and hail mixture. Not only was it green, but how many more dinosaurs do you know?

Beast Boy rumbled a hello.

I was ecstatic. I thought for sure he'd rejected me just like the others was the first time in a long time I'd felt hope or happiness. And now I felt both as he led me to the nearest tree.


	6. The First of Many Adventures

-Chapter 6-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

Beast Boy shifted into the warmest thing he could think of, a woolly mammoth, and laid down under the tree with me. I was already exhausted from my fifteen-minute hike. Being pregnant didn't help that aspect of things at all. Since I was from Azurath, my pregnancy symptoms were tons more extreme than a normal human's. Therefore, fatigue hit me harder than an anvil. I was already slipping into a dreamless sleep. I felt warm under Beast Boy's long fur. He even lent me the thinner end of his trunk to use as a pillow. My eyes grew heavy, and I made myself comfortable under his five-foot-long fur and on his trunk. Then I silently drifted into my less active state.

Beast Boy looked up at the sky. He, too, had fallen asleep due to slight exhaustion. It was night and the cold storm had just passed. I was still asleep, but Beast Boy had to get up and stretch, at the very least. So he picked me up and set me back down with such gentleness that wouldn't have woken a kitten from its slumber. He got up, yawned for a good minute, then morphed back into a human and stretched his slightly sore muscles.

After that, he turned around to check on me. After confirming that I was KO'd, he began searching for some food in the bag I'd brought with me. There was none. My bag contained some maternity clothes I'd been hiding deep in the back of my closet, some toothpaste, a hairbrush, and a toothbrush. And that was it.

Being careful not to wake me, even though he knew he could blast some rock music and that wouldn't have woken me up, he searched the landscape. And then, thinking solely of me, he shifted from human to warthog and began digging for truffles underground. Knowing I'd be starving when I woke, he searched for as many as he could. But the land wasn't fertile enough for the luscious fungi, and he could only find about two or three. After a good thirty minutes of turning up ground, Beast Boy changed back to human and gave up. He didn't want to leave me by myself for too long; he knew all the dangers the real world faced.

I woke to my growling stomach. I kept forgetting I was eating for two now... I looked around me until I found who I was looking for: Beast Boy. He sat slumped over the mushrooms he'd found earlier. "Hey." I greeted. I sat up, but I sat up too soon. A huge wave of dizziness overwhelmed me and I had to lay back down and hold my throbbing head.

Hearing my greeting, Beast Boy turned to face me, but only saw me holding my head. "You okay, Raven?" he asked me, tenderness evident in his voice.

"Yeah, just a little dizzy is all." I assured.

"So, Raven... Um, about you being pregnant... I was just thinking about how everything makes sense now. Your weird cravings, the way you sleep so much, why you've grown a little lazier, your morning sickness. It all ties together now. The reason behind it all is because you're pregnant. What's it like?" he asked.

I let my hand slide off my forehead, then I sighed. "Where do I even begin...?" I mumbled. "Ah! I know. It's like you ate a chocolate-covered pickle, and now the chocolate-covered pickle is kicking you." I described.

He chuckled light-heartedly. "I didn't mean the baby kicking you. I meant overall. What's it like to be pregnant?"

"Beast Boy, I can't really explain it. All I can tell you is most people think of you as a slut for it." I replied truthfully.

But, much to my surprise, this only served to anger Beast Boy. "Raven, you aren't a slut! Stop it! You're just...in a difficult position right now." he tried to console.

Quickly changing the subject, I sniffed the air a little. Something smelled really good. "Hey, Beast Boy, what's that smell?"

"Oh. I just found some truffles earlier, while you were still asleep. You want 'em?" he asked.

I nodded, failing to remember my manners as I chowed down on the edible, delicious fungus. It was so good I ended up eating all three truffles and completely forgot about Beast Boy. When I finally remembered him, not only was it too late, but he assured me he hated truffles because they grew underground. He also hated potatoes and carrots because they grew underground. I had no choice but to comply with his wishes. But I knew he loved potatoes. And I knew his ulterior motive for this. He wasn't worrying about his own hunger at all, he just wanted me to eat so I'd have at least a little bit of energy.

After we ate, Beast Boy asked me if I was ready to go back home yet. I couldn't believe he'd ask something like that, but nonetheless I answered, "This is my home. Besides, I've always wanted to go camping. I've heard its alot of fun."

"You've never gone camping before?" the stunned hero asked.

"Nope. Beast Boy, you have to understand something about me. Because of certain issues with my father, I've never had a real childhood. Sure, I was a child once, but I never had fun. I was constantly training to control my emotions and my powers. I spent nearly all my life doing that. That's probably the one thing that concerns me most with the baby. I'm not sure what fun is, being as I've never experienced it. But I don't want the child to grow up the way I did." I said.

"Wow. I'm sorry. I never knew that about you, Raven." he responded kindly.

"It's not a big deal; it's all in the past now. What I'm worried about is the future." I told him.

He didn't seem to know how to answer that. A slight smile crept onto my lips as I realized I'd never talked to anyone like this before.

"Maybe I can help you out with that camping problem. In fact, we can travel all over the world! It'll be fun, whadya say?" he suggested.

"Alright." I agreed. "But let's hold it off until morning. It's kinda dark out right now."

"Deal." The two of us shook hands and that's when nausea came back to haunt me.

I immediately released his hand and covered my stomach. I turned around so that if I had to vomit on a moments' notice, it wouldn't be on him.

"Raven, everything okay?" he asked cautiously. I think he knew what was wrong, but I couldn't tell him. I feared if I opened my mouth, contents would start flying.

"Raven?" he continued.

I bent over and ran awkwardly over to the tree we'd slept under and emptied my stomach. After ten minutes of this, I was beat and ready to sleep again. I didn't have much to eat, and my body was burning useful energy like crazy now that I was pregnant. My high metabolism could very easily kill me if I wasn't careful.

Beast Boy had finally figured it out. Morning sickness occurred not just in the morning, but at night and during the middle of the day, too. Since it was night and the temperature was dropping even still, he turned into a polar bear and laid down beside me, even though he wasn't anywhere near tired. But realizing that taking care of me and the baby was definitely going to be a full-time job, he made as much effort as he could to go to sleep. Eventually it worked.

* * *

Three hours into the cold night, and an angry mother bear followed her stray cub into the area where we were at. Beast Boy was the first to sense its presence, and quickly woke me with a series of shushes. When I looked up, I saw the same thing he did. A big bear sniffing the ground and her cub playing right beside it.

Beast Boy speedily took charge of the situation and rose up very slowly, but only enough to help me up. Once we were both up, he shushed me one more time before gently nudging my upper back, telling me he wanted me to get out.

I didn't hesitate to listen to him. Unfortunately, my adrenaline was rapidly spreading throughout my body and I got a little _too_ eager to get out. I ended up trying to run and tripping in my rush over a fallen log. Not only did I twist my ankle in my right foot, but another oddly-timed wave of dizziness came over me and it got so bad I couldn't move.

What's worse is that the great mother bear heard all the noise I'd stirred up and started charging at me.

Beast Boy instantaneously shape shifted into the same type of bear, supposedly a brown bear, and roared at the mother bear. Knowing she was just defending her young, he didn't intend to hurt her. He just wanted her to focus on him rather than me. His roaring worked, and the mother bear immediately stopped and turned her attention towards him. He stood up on his hind paws and tried to look as intimidating as possible to the momma bear. It worked, but it didn't get her to go away.

My dizziness was almost cleared up, but not completely. I decided that it could be now or never and got up with a little difficulty. My ankle was killing me, but I shrugged it off and concentrated on levitating up to the near-top of the tree I was under. It worked, but only for a moment. I had to grab the predestined branch and pull myself up. But at least I was safe from the bear fight that was sure to unfold unless Beast Boy hit the road.

It was a good thing he knew animals so well, because he hightailed it out of there and morphed into a vampire bat. Using the method of echolocation, he found me very easily. Then he changed into a bird so he could alight on the branch beside me. Then he morphed to human and sighed deeply.

"So... Is she gone?" I asked, referring to the angry mother bear. I already knew the answer, but I felt like I should thank him, at very least.

"Yeah, she's gone." he answered.

Right when I was about to thank him for staying with me, and for saving me from the bear, I heard a loud snap next to me, on the fat end of the branch. I shot my head towards the sound and saw the source: the branch couldn't hold our weight.

Sensing this, Beast Boy once more took charge and jumped off the branch, changing into a bird as he did so. He landed on the ground below me. The branch slowly started to lean down. Even with Beast Boy off of it, our weight had pushed its limit, and it couldn't hold my weight. Another lovely thought.

Beast Boy was back to human. His arms were outstretched above him. "Jump, Raven!" he commanded. When he saw how hesitant I was, he assured me he'd catch me. Yeah, as though that really helped...

Before I could even process his assurance, the branch snapped and hung off the tree. I tried to grab it before I fell, but it was too late. It was just out of my reach. The fall itself wasn't that long; before I knew it Beast Boy was underneath me. I landed right on top of him. I have to admit I wasn't entirely opposed to being on top of him, but it still hurt. Thankfully he'd broken my fall. Poor guy...

"Beast Boy, are you okay?" I asked him. Right then the baby chose to kick the crap out of me.

Beast Boy's head shot up and he grinned at me. It was almost humorous because his grin, I swear, reached from one ear to the other. I stifled a laugh at his foolish nature.

"Raven, didja feel that? The baby kicked! It's kicking! It's so cool and weird at the same time!" Beast Boy yelled excitedly. He then proceeded to prop me up so he could put his ear to my belly. My baby kicked him in the head and it only made him grin wider. "I can feel it..." he whispered.

I didn't get angry with him at all. In fact, I thought it was sweet. For once I didn't mind the fact that I was showing.

"Is it a boy or a girl?" he asked, his head staying put and apparently not eager to pass up this moment.

"I won't know until it's born." I answered.

"You want it to be a surprise?" he assumed.

"No, that's not it. It's just, I'm from Azurath. Like Starfire, I'm an alien to earth. Azuran women don't know what the child's gender is until it's born." I replied truthfully.

"Oh. Do Azuran men know? I mean, maybe they could tell their wives when they get pregnant. If they knew, that is." he said.

"Wives? Marriages on Azurath don't exist. As soon as he's through with the woman, he leaves for another." I explained.

"That's horrible! Isn't the girl hurt when he leaves?" Beast Boy continued to question.

"Yeah, but that's just our way of life. It's how our population grows or drops. Right now, Azurath's population is dwindling, but it'll rise again soon enough. And while I'm telling you these things, I should also tell you that Azurans don't easily get impregnated. Azurath is the least fertile planet. This is because Azuran women have a fertility rate of about .01 percent. It's really low, huh?" I have to say, that was probably the most embarrassing thing I've ever told anyone in my entire life. But Beast Boy needed to understand more about me and where I came from if he was going to keep protecting me like this.

He brushed himself off and stood up from his bent-over position. The baby had stopped kicking, and he didn't want to make me angry.

"Yeah, I guess that's pretty low." he said. "Raven? Are you hurt about being pregnant?"

Any smile that may have been on my face definitely disappeared. "Hurt?" I asked.

"Yeah. Because if you are, I don't want you to be. And if you aren't, that's great." he said.

I knew he meant this with good intentions, but the pain stabbed at my heart nonetheless. I decided perhaps it was better he thought I was okay. "I'm fine." I lied. But my body's response to his questioning said differently.

"Raven..." he mumbled. "You're lying to me..."

"W-What? I'm not lying." I said. I was totally lying. Hot, salty tears were streaming down my cheeks and I couldn't stop them from coming.

"Are you hurt because...you think maybe the child's gonna be fatherless?" he asked.

That just hurt worse... But I didn't want him to feel like he had to be the father of a child that wasn't his. Unfortunately, I was too choked up and couldn't say anything. Instead, I turned around and shook my head.

Beast Boy didn't go any further from there. He waited patiently for me to stop crying before he shifted into an always-comforting woolly mammoth and laid down beside me.

I snuggled up under his thick coat and rested through the rest of the night.


	7. A Shoulder to Lean On

-Chapter 7-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

When I woke up the very next morning, I found Beast Boy still sleeping. I got up and looked around. I had no idea where I was. Being part animal, Beast Boy may have some kind of instinct that could get us out of here, but I didn't want to wake him up just to ask him a trivial thing like that.

I stretched, yawned, and then remembered what happened last night. Beast Boy had asked me those painful questions. Honestly, I hadn't even asked myself those questions yet. More tears dripped from my face. Even while groggy, I still remembered very clearly what those questions were, and what had happened. A hand automatically reached up to cover my abdomen.

"Well," I whispered, "It looks like you're not gonna have a real father, after all. I'm sorry."

The baby kicked, almost as though in response.

"I'm sorry, baby... I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I wish I could undo it all... You know? Get my life back..." I sobbed. I knew I was having a conversation with an unborn baby I never wanted, but I had no one else to talk to at the moment.

Beast Boy groggily lifted his head. I was the first thing he saw. He didn't know what I was doing, so he kept quiet and listened to my strange conversation.

Blissfully unaware that Beast Boy had awoken, I continued my talking to the unborn child. "I... I don't know what to do anymore, baby. I don't know what I'm doing right now. Did I really do the right thing?" I asked to no one in particular, fully aware the baby couldn't answer. It seemed to kick less at the sound of my voice.

Beast Boy shifted from mammoth to human, and continued to be quiet, hoping to find out what I was talking about.

"You think there could've been an alternative way to solve this?" I cried, "Why couldn't this have turned out differently? What did I do to deserve this? I mean, it's not like I _wanted_ to sleep with Slade! I hate him! I just want all this to go away!" I dropped to my knees, desperate for some answer, some sign that what I did was the best thing to do.

Beast Boy came over and startled me by putting a hand on my shoulder. A friendly gesture was just what I needed right now. "What did Slade do, Raven?" he asked quietly. That wasn't what I needed.

I turned around so I could lean into him, the pain overwhelming me. I then started shakily explaining what happened between me and Slade. As just stated, my voice was shaky and uncertain. After I was done crying and explaining everything to him, he understood exactly what happened and he, too, grew angry towards Slade. But, being careful not to upset me even more, he asked tenderly, "What does Slade want from you?"

I wiped away the stale tears and wet trails on my face. I could easily answer that. "It's not even me he wants. It's the baby. He got furious that Robin refused to be his apprentice, and eventually he got desperate. He captured me and told me it was a baby or you guys. Like I said, I chose the baby. He wants me to raise the baby until it can start training. Then he'll take it and I'll probably never see it again."

"So then...part of this was actually Robin's fault. And then he said all those things to you..." Beast Boy's eyebrows furrowed in anger.

"No, no. It's not his fault. In a way, he's right. I might have been able to find a different solution." I denied.

"You and I both know that's not true, Raven. When you're backed into a corner like that and only given two options on such short notice, you don't have any time to think about an alternative solution. You pick one of the two options and move on. That's how it always is." he said, a certain passion masking itself in fury.

"Beast Boy, exactly how much of my conversation did you hear?" I asked curiously.

"Enough to know you need a shoulder to lean on." he replied wisely.

I didn't know what else to do, so I nodded just once.

"And also enough to know you're worried about the baby growing up without a proper father." he added.

My head jerked up at this, hoping he wasn't going to ask what I thought he was going to ask.

He continued forward with his point, "Raven, if that's what you're worried about, I could-"

"No." I interrupted, "Beast Boy, you're a bubbly, cheerful, kind guy who lives an otherwise carefree life. I don't want you getting caught up in something you're only going to regret later on. This isn't what you really want and I don't want to make you feel like you have to do this for me."

"Raven," he said ever so seriously, "If I _didn't_ want to do this, then believe me when I tell you I wouldn't have asked in the first place."

"And you're serious? You're wanting to commit to being a father of a baby that isn't even yours?" I asked, skeptical still.

"I'm as serious as serious can get." he said.

I looked deep into his eyes. His expression was unfazed, and his eyes were full of hopefulness. That was something I could hardly reject. "Alright." I complied, hoping I wasn't making a mistake.

Beast Boy pulled me into a tight hug, as though to thank me for letting him be part of my and the baby's life. That was when something inside me stirred, and it wasn't the baby. For the first time in my life, I felt a new kind of emotion. It was one that couldn't actually be described, but it was a good feeling. The kind you'd want to feel every day of your life. Any other time, I'd be irritated by being hugged, but for some unknown reason, I was allowing him to cling to me as long as he wanted. Perhaps it was because I owed him this favor for staying by my side through it all, this whole time. Perhaps it was the simple fact that I might be having a mood swing. Or perhaps it was something...more.

Beast Boy let go of me and apologized, knowing how much I hate to be hugged. "Sorry, I kinda just got caught in the moment, you know?"

"It's okay." I said, wishing he hadn't let go so soon. Sweet moment over, hello awkward silence.

We decided to walk to the nearest town we could find, in order to get real food and other necessities. I ended up falling asleep and Beast Boy had to carry me. Meanwhile, the baby kicked almost the whole time. Luckily, I was so tired it didn't wake me up.

And then, after two hours of searching, we found a town. God only knows what it was called, but hey, if it was civilization, I wasn't gonna be too picky.

Beast Boy whinnied, being a horse at the time, and tried to trot a little to get me to awaken. As to be expected, it didn't work. A tad on the frustrated side, he jumped about an inch in the air by using his powerful limb muscles like a spring. This seemed to bring me a little closer to full consciousness. Refusing to morph to human, afraid that I'd drop like a sack of potatoes if he did, he jumped a little higher, probably an inch and a half. I plopped down on his saddleless back and finally woke up. I lazily slid off the poor, probably tired green stallion and yawned.

Beast Boy, grateful to have the extra weight off of him, turned back into a human. He, too, stood up and yawned. Then his put his knuckles behind his back and pushed his back inwardly, making his spine produce disturbing popping sounds. Then he felt relaxed and stretched a little more.

Feeling nervous about a new environment, I quickly scanned the surroundings. The initial need to feel secure subsiding, I quit scanning and took the time to actually survey the town. It wasn't big, rather small actually, and had a few fast food restaurants within just a few steps of a bank. Everything was slightly old-themed, but nothing was like, old-westerly themed. Funny, because if that were the case, Beast Boy would fit right in as a nice mustang or bronco or something. That thought served to bring up another thought in my mind: we _really_ had to get a saddle and some reins for Beast Boy. Okay, maybe not the reins, but a saddle was a must-have if he was gonna bounce around like he did. A stallion's back isn't exactly the softest place in the world to land. Those of you who've been bareback know.

Beast Boy lead me into the town, almost as though he knew the place. But what was weird was that so many people looked scared of me. Why? What had I done? Sure, the town looked vaguely familiar, but I had no idea why. It wasn't long before I was led to the salad bar in a nearby restaurant.

"Why a salad bar?" I asked Beast Boy.

"Because you need healthy foods for the baby." he answered.

Wow. He really _was_ serious about this, wasn't he? Anyway, he was right. Now that I was carrying precious cargo, I needed to stop snacking on potato chips and start eating foods with lots of nutrients in them. But the bad part was: I hated salads. Instead, I would prefer herbal tea. Much better tasting, and great for meditation, too.

I went through the contents of the salad bar, cramming as much food onto my plate as possible. I admit I grew a little embarrassed when I received unwanted stares from people I've never met before, but it's not like we were going to start living in this town, anyway. We'd probably just rent a little motel room for a day, to catch up on some much-needed rest, and then move on tomorrow.

Beast Boy ate a salad, too. Though it was much smaller than mine. Compared to his, mine was like a mountain. His was just one of those bumps in the road. He, too, couldn't help but stare at my gargantuan helping of food.

Growing more embarrassed, I accidentally let a little bit of my powers loose. As soon as my blushing reached about half its maximum level, a chair's leg melted from overheated raw energy. Immediately I regained control of emotions by reminding myself that I have an excuse to eat more. I couldn't undo the chair's leg melting, but I could prevent anymore damages from happening.

* * *

After we'd eaten lunch and paid for the food, we searched the town for a motel. It was then that it hit me.

"Uh, Beast Boy, do we have enough money for a motel?" I asked the green prankster.

"Don't worry about that." he answered, "I brought more than enough money for _six_ motel _suites_!"

I didn't even ask where he got the money. It would make me feel really guilty if he said he'd been saving it up or something like that. And emotion was one thing I couldn't afford, especially with no control over my powers.


	8. Friction

-Chapter 8-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

It was very late at night when Starfire couldn't take it anymore. She'd fallen into a depression about my absence and hated that I'd gone away. She finally decided to confront Robin about it.

"I am...missing Raven." she said, hoping to gain pity towards me.

"Yeah, well, she's the one who left. I didn't kick her out or anything. I'm still happy she's gone. The further away she is, the further away Slade's duplicate is." Robin mercilessly spoke.

"But she ain't carrying Slade's duplicate, man. She's carrying her child. Beast Boy was right, she's still the same Raven we all know. She hasn't changed." Cyborg added.

"I don't care if it's her child! It's got Slade's genes in it! That little demon's _gotta_ be evil if it's born to Slade!" he protested.

"Raven is birthing a demon child?" Starfire screeched.

"No, Star. She ain't giving birth to a demon child. She's giving birth to her _own_ child. Robin's just too mad to see it." Cyborg answered.

"I'm not mad, I'm furious! How could Raven sleep with Slade, of all people?" he yelled.

"I don't know. But I'm sure Raven has some kinda reason behind it." Cyborg replied.

"You should apologize to her! She did not deserve what you said!" Starfire demanded.

"You're the one who shunned her!" Robin yelled in his defense.

"And I did not wish to do so! Raven is our friend, and we must treat her with respect, whether we agree with her decisions or not!" she fumed.

"I agree with Star, man. Raven's been through enough. Despite making that kind of choice, we shouldn't have done what we did to her. And it's not just Star, we're all at fault here." Cyborg said, drawing a line that ended the conversation.

* * *

I was having a blast. Knowing Beast Boy was there to protect me, I felt safe and could rest easy. Plus they had a fridge full of little snacks and treats I could munch on if I got hungry. But I wasn't the only one taking it easy, Beast Boy was also having a great time. He sat in front of the TV and watched America's Funniest Home Videos and then slept a little and then turned the TV back on. At least now I knew where he got all his lame jokes from...

I yawned and woke up to a hungry stomach. It seemed I was hungry every time I woke up. Almost on reflex, I went to the little fridge full of snacks.

Beast Boy's television program was rudely interrupted by a prolonged beeping sound. He located the source very quickly. It was his Titans' communicator. He'd forgotten to dramatically throw it down when he left. He glanced at my crouched figure in the kitchen. After confirming to himself I hadn't heard the sound, he reluctantly answered, walking onto the small balcony as he did.

"Beast Boy! Oh, how joyous of this day to present to us your nostalgic face!" Starfire chirped.

"What did you guys call me for? If Raven finds out about this..." Beast Boy trailed off in deep thought. He knew I'd probably be heartbroken at the remembrance of what happened not long ago.

"I called so we could discuss Raven." Starfire declared. "We are very sorry about what has happened, and we miss her."

"Yeah? Well, don't tell that to me, tell it to her!" Beast Boy angrily replied.

"We wish for her to return to us." Starfire continued.

"Right, because Raven's not been through enough yet, has she?" he thundered.

"What do you mean, 'not enough'? She is still our friend, is she not?" she sadly asked.

"What you guys did to her is still tearing her up! You know what it's like looking into your best friend's eyes, and then seeing nothing behind them? It's like her soul ripped in two!" he roared.

"I-I did not know..." she cried sorrowfully.

"Well you should have thought about that before you all abandoned her! Anyway, I've got something to say to Robin; put him on." he said, the passion to protect me suddenly returning.

Starfire was astonished at this unpredictable outburst from the most light-hearted guy in the Titans, but nevertheless told Robin to get on.

"Beast Boy? Is that you? Star told me you wanted to tell me something." Robin said.

"Yeah, I do have something to tell you. It's about Raven." Before Beast Boy could continue onward to the next sentence, Robin cut him off.

"Don't even bother bringing her up! You know how that makes me feel! She's still the same slut that-"

"Will you just shut up and listen to me?" Beast Boy screamed. "Raven's not a slut, for the millionth time! She's-"

Before he could even finish up, the communicator shut off from lack of battery. Looked like the conversation was over.

I came outside, in search of my companion. I was happy when I found him outside on the little balcony. But my joy was short-lived when I found him stressed and fuming. "W-What's wrong?" I asked him, hoping it wasn't something too bad.

Without a word, he pivoted, grabbed my face, and looked hard into my eye. He tilted my head up so the light partly shown on my pupil. He was starting to scare me. Finally, and after what felt like an eternity, he released me with a disappointed expression covering his normally cheery face. "It's not there..." he whispered.

"What's not there? What were you looking for?" I questioned.

"It's nothing, Raven. Sorry I worried you." he said before walking back into the main room.

I made no argument with him. I didn't want to. Especially given how much he'd done for me in the past few days, I was worried maybe he'd found a flaw in staying with me. I really needed to start preparing myself in case he ever decided this was too much for him to handle.

"Beast Boy," I called after him, "I really need to know if something's wrong."

The answer came back undeterred. "Everything's fine, Raven. I just have a headache."

The words echoed in my head. I couldn't help but start thinking there was something wrong with me. And then I realized it: he had a life to live. But if I left, not only would he track me down somehow, but I'd be left all alone for an amount of time. Selfishly, I couldn't handle that right now. Emotionally, I'd die if that happened. But what was Beast Boy looking for when he said it wasn't there? And what did I have to do with any of it? I couldn't comprehend what was going through his mind, but I was sure it had something to do with me.

"Raven," a voice intruded my thoughts. I looked up to find Beast Boy smiling at me. Finally, the usual jokester face I was so used to seeing. "It's not you." he said, decided to be at least slightly honest with me. "I was just thinking about the day you left. You didn't wait for my response, and I just assumed you'd given up on me, too. So I came with you to help you out. And besides, you're my friend. I don't wanna lose you just 'cause you're...you know."

Realizing he'd lightened up, I, too, lightened up. "I hope you aren't thinking about my weight right now." I warned him playfully.

He chuckled. "Don't worry."

Before I could so much as take a step forward, a contraction hit me hard. I instinctively bent down to ease the pain. It was the first contraction I ever had throughout my pregnancy, and I was scared I may have been actually going into labor. One hand found its way over my belly, while the other searched wildly for something to grip.

Beast Boy sprung into action. But even though it seemed like a dramatic moment, the contraction ended quickly, leaving me to wonder what had just happened to me. Beast Boy looked just as confused as I was. "What happened?" he asked.

"I don't know. I think I had a contraction. But now it's gone." I replied uncertainly.

This only seemed to freak the poor guy out. "The baby's not coming yet, is it?"

"No, no. It was a false contraction. Think of it as my body's way of practicing for when the baby _does_ come." I said.

He relaxed some, but not entirely, as the shock of the scene wore off. "Oh, okay." he sighed.

I couldn't help but smile at him. "Don't worry, I'm not having the baby for another six months." And then I realized his behavior today, so I added, "But when I do have it, try to stay calm."

He nodded, just relieved it wasn't coming right now. That false contraction had really caught him off his guard, and he was completely unprepared for it. Honestly, I didn't blame him. I was just as prepared as he was. Not that it helped matters any, but now it was just another bulletin to add to my list of pregnancy ordeals.


	9. Life in the Desert

-Chapter 9-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

Two months had passed; I was now eight months pregnant, and still not at full-term. Beast Boy had been loyal, defending me against wild predatory animals that wanted nothing more than a tasty meal. And with me, they could get two for the price of one. Being the one who embodied nature itself, he knew this and refused to let them have their target. It seemed as though we often ran into one particular coyote pack often enough to know they keep tracking us.

However, in escaping, avoiding, and fighting the forces of nature, we somehow ended up in a desert area. Beast Boy had long ago transformed into a camel with two humps, so I could ride easier, and carried me across who-knows-how-much of the desert. We hadn't had a decent place to stay in too long a time. It was beginning to get old.

"Beast Boy, how much longer?" I asked, knowing full well he had no idea. I just needed something to spark a conversation.

Beast Boy responded by snorting. As a camel, he couldn't talk. So he made camel noises he found similar to human noises to show his emotions. Most of the noises resembled displeasure, agreement, or frustration.

"I have to stretch again; my back is killing me." I told him.

He nodded understandingly before laying down to let me off. Then he changed into a human and flopped onto the sand. His back cracked several times as he rolled around, happy to be relieved of my weight and the weight packed in his two humps.

I stretched, happy to be off of a camel. I wasn't anywhere near complaints, though. If not for him, I'd still be stuck in that little town, if I was lucky enough to have gotten there. So if anything at all, I was gracious toward the little green humanimal.

After my relaxing stretch, I stared at the sunset for a bit. I had been in the desert long enough to know just how low the temperatures could get. It was amazing, really. During the day, it feels like you're at the equator, but during the night, it feels like you're in the depths of cold and lonely planet Pluto. Fortunately, the sand made awesome beds. Soft, always there, sometimes even heated. The only downside was the midnight sandstorms. Oh, they were horrible! The sand got all in your eyes and irritated them badly. And it burned as the merciless sand scraped against your skin, over and over and over. And your hair? Not only greasy, but itching crazily! I knew what those drama books were saying when they talked about braving the sandstorms.

"It sure feels good to be human again." he pointed out. He was right; he'd been an animal for a long time considering how many times he's had to transform lately.

"It sure feels good to be able to walk again." I corrected. I had been riding him for so long, I was starting to chafe in places I didn't even know I had. And my muscles were aching from doing nothing but sitting in between his two humps all day long.

"Yeah, easy for you to say. If you still had your powers, I'd be asking you to carry me instead of the other way around." he contradicted.

"Good point, but riding on you isn't the easiest thing in the world. My butt's still numb." I told him, realizing too late that I'd said too much information. "A-Anyway," I continued nervously, "I'm just gonna walk for awhile."

"Can I ride on you this time?" he joked back.

I continued forward, him following as a human. I knew he'd probably be out of this desert by now if it weren't for me. He could've just turned into a cheetah and ran off. But he stayed because he cared about me so much; because I was so important to him. That thought sent butterflies fluttering in my stomach. I realized I was blushing and quickly shook the thought out of my head. But then another thought entered and I sighed. Beast Boy didn't care for me like that, he just cared for me as a friend.

"Hey, Raven, is something on your mind?" I heard him ask. I started blushing again, but kept myself calm. He didn't know, so there was no reason to panick.

"Uh, no. I'm just a little hungry." I replied.

"Oh. You should've told me sooner." he said, waiting for me to ask why.

"Why?" I asked.

"'Cause you can eat cacti." he answered, smiling proudly. But his smile soon vanished as he saw me wince at the thought of spikes digging their way into my tongue. Then he proceeded to correct his error, "No, no! You don't actually eat the tough outer skin of it! You cute off the top and eat the fruits inside. Their not spiky, so you can eat them easily. And the best part is, they contain alot of water. You won't get dehydrated." he explained.

"And...how are we supposed to cut open the cactus without my powers?" I asked.

Beast Boy let a smug grin slide across his face. He pretended to clear his throat to get my attention, and then he morphed into a large black bear. He ventured to the nearest cactus and slashed it open with his exceedingly long fingernails. Then he delicately pulled apart the tough outer shell of the cactus.

Nutritious fluids drizzled down the spiky plant and onto Beast Boy's claws, making them look glossy in the soft light of the sunset.

He shifted from bear to human and plucked out a green fruit about the size of an apple. "Try it." he urged me. Then, as if to seal the deal, he took a bite out of it.

I took one out and bit into it. It was super juicy, but delicious. Not like an apple or peach taste, but it could've been my ever-present cravings that made this normally-unknown fruit taste so satisfying.

Satiated with my contentedness, he ate the remnants of his fruit and waited for me to finish up. Eating watery foods wasn't the best idea I've ever had.

"Uh, Beast Boy, I have to use the bathroom." I whined. I didn't mean to whine, but my bladder couldn't take this torture anymore! It was starting to hurt.

Beast Boy's face grew beat-red and he pointed towards the shredded, now empty cactus. Then he turned around and walked a little distance from me. He may be my protector, but even he didn't want to watch me do my business.

I ran behind the cactus and relieved myself. Then I came back as quickly as I could manage, while eight months pregnant I might add, and told him I was ready to go.

* * *

That night, both of us had to rest. Beast Boy had usually been sleeping while I was awake, but now he couldn't hold off any longer and needed to sleep for real. That said, neither of us awakened to the growling that surrounded us. The coyote pack had finally caught up to us.

The assumed leader of the group, the alpha-female, was the largest of them all and was starving. Deprived of food, and unadapted to desert environments, she ravenously looked me over. Ignoring Beast Boy entirely, she let loose a low, nearly noiseless rumble from deep in the back of her trachea. Apparently this signaled to the other members of the pack that I was the chosen course, because all the pack members slowly closed in on us.

At the best of timing, I rolled over in my sleep and accidentally slapped Beast Boy. This woke him up instantly, as he'd become very alert to sounds and sensitive to touch over the amount of time spent traveling with me. It didn't take him two seconds to see the threat.

"Raven," he whispered harshly, "Raven, wake up."

The coupe continued snarling and drooling. They were swimming in hunger, and if no one took charge soon, they'd be chowing down on me in three seconds flat.

Beast Boy knew I wasn't going to wake unless a loud sound or a violent shaking were to take place. He had no other choice but to transform into a T-Rex and roar as loud as he could. And believe me, it was _loud_. More than enough to wake me from my slumber.

The pack backed away a small amount of distance, knowing they couldn't take down such prey that size. But their bellies pulled them back to me, and they worked as one organism. Most of the pack started trying to distract Beast Boy. It didn't work; he knew their goal.

He hovered over me, and towered over the feral pack. Roaring again, except not as loud this time, he pretended to claim me as his. Not as a mate, but as his dinner. He lowered his head evenly with mine, trying to assure me this wouldn't hurt. It wasn't working. He opened his fanged mouth and scooped me up in it, picking up quite a bit of sand as he did.

I thought he'd finally lost it, and I tried to jump down from his ascending head. I would've succeeded, too, had it not been for the upper jaw slamming down before I could even reach the edge of his mouth. I was trapped now, contained only my the lack of my power usage.

Beast Boy growled at the pack before walking off with 'his territory', also known as me.

* * *

Once we were at a safe distance, Beast Boy allowed his large head to descend to the ground. Then my freedom came; his jaws opened and I flew out of there, just now realizing his little stunt.

"Don't _do_ that!" I shrieked.

Beast Boy changed back into a human and laughed hysterically. "I can't believe you headbutted my teeth! You really thought I was gonna eat you!"

"Can it!" I snapped, "You did that without any warning!"

"But you have to admit it was a good escape plan." Beast Boy argued.

"...Yeah, I guess. But you just wait 'til I get my powers back. Then you can go and I can protect myself." I said.

"But, then...I wouldn't be there to help raise the baby. I already told you I wanted to be there..." His disappointed expression told me he was dead serious.

"You can be there if you want; I'm just saying that in case you ever want to leave." I said, completely truthful.

Before Beast Boy could continue the argument, I felt dizzy for about two seconds and collapsed. He wasn't worried because this had happened before. Actually, it happened alot. He laid down beside me and reluctantly slept.


	10. More Secrets Unveiled

-Chapter 10-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

The next morning, I waited for Beast Boy to awaken from his unconscious state. Last night had been a little rougher than usual, because that coyote pack had never truly gotten that close to eating me before. The stress, I figured, must've made him more tired than usual.

Still not out of the desert, we seemed stranded. If only there were a convenient town located right where we were... I scanned the landscape, looking for any trace of human life. Nada. I sighed deeply. This may take more time than I thought.

Beast Boy stirred, bringing me out of my thoughts. It was high time he was up and about. He groggily wiped his eyes. "Heya, Raven. You're up." he yawned.

"Yeah, I'm up. ...And I have a question." I replied, "You wanna start going back? We don't seem to be getting anywhere."

"Go back?" he asked, shocked, "No way! We've come so far!"

"How do you know? For all we know, we could still have half the desert to go." I pointed out.

"Well, we've been here for a month, and I doubt we've been going in a circle this whole time. We've _gotta_ be close to the end by now." he said.

I sighed again, wondering why we couldn't have ended up in an apple orchard or something. Right now even lemons seemed delicious.

"C'mon, Raven. We'll make it through this." he encouraged.

I let another sigh escape me and headed in the direction we were going before. I really hoped he was right about this whole 'near the end' thing. I watched him turn into a camel again and even though I smiled at the thought of his kindness, I had probably become too experienced in bareback camel-riding. I had to decline the offer, but hey, it was the thought that counted, right?

He morphed back into a human and grinned. "I'm just playing with you." he said. "I already know you're tired of riding a camel."

* * *

"Is it working?" Starfire asked.

"No, it's not. I can't connect to Beast Boy's communicator; I dunno why." Robin replied.

"Maybe it died." Cyborg suggested.

"You'd think he'd have kept that thing charged, though." he said.

Cyborg smiled foolishly and glanced the other way. "Well, uh...you know this is Beast Boy we're talkin' about, right?"

Robin's expression dimmed. "Yeah, you gotta point. But he's traveling with Raven, so I just thought he'd have charged it somewhere. That thing's plug can fit into any outlet."

Starfire was the first to remember that Beast Boy never even figured out how to use the toaster properly. "Uh, I believe Beast Boy does not know how to use an 'outlet'."

"Maybe something else happened to 'em." Robin insinuated.

"Something else? But the last I saw of our friends, they were in a room. Everything seemed calm." she continued.

"Yeah, man. I doubt something else happened to 'em. Why can't we just track the last signal that came from BB's communicator?" Cyborg asked.

"Because Beast Boy's traveling with Raven. I doubt he's abandoned her. He's not the kind of guy who'd do that." Robin answered.

"Aw, man! Are you for real? You're still angry with her?" he groaned.

* * *

* * *

I yawned, once again tired from an arduous journey. Beast Boy noticed the signal and transformed himself into a camel, again. I climbed on top of him and was relieved that I had someone to even climb on top of. I really needed to thank him, but how? I needed something to show him I cared about him, too. Even if it was just as friends...perhaps a nice dinner would do? I mentally slapped myself. As if... Beast Boy was into Terra, not me.

Beast Boy morphed back into a human. It was on such short notice that I fell off his back as he was morphing. I asked why he did that and the answer I recieved was great news.

"Raven! Look!" he exclaimed, "It's a town!" He leapt, I swear, around three feet in the air.

I glanced the way he was pointing and sure enough, there was a town there. It seemed like a long distance to me, but for Beast Boy that would be nothing. I was dragging him down by alot. He could be outta there by now, but instead he waited and waited for me to catch up. It was starting to seem as though I just...never would.

Maybe it was just a mood swing, but I was sure I felt tears running down my face. The harshness of the world was upon me again as I realized not only would my unborn child be taken from me, but I'd endanger all my closest friends, including Beast Boy.

Beast Boy grabbed my waist and pulled me close to him until we were standing side by side. "Raven, I'm happy as well, but not to the point of crying. What's wrong?"

I wiped away the dreaded emotional tears and answered, "I have to tell you something...about the baby." This seemed to catch his attention instantly, so I continued, "When an Azuran's child is taken from her before it reaches adulthood, the mother literally goes crazy. Feeling unable to live without the child, she does anything and everything she can to get it back. But, in searching for it, she gets out of control."

Beast Boy's expression changed from happy to confused. "What are you talking about?"

"When Slade comes to take the baby, people will die. I won't be able to control myself because of the strong maternal instinct. My powers will grow to an intensely strong level. And if it gets to the point where I'm left uncontained, I could destroy not just cities, but worlds." I explained.

"But you'll have me here, so-"

"It won't change anything, Beast Boy. The only way to stop me is to bring back the child. Then I'll calm down and stop searching. Even if some innocent citizen pleads with me or begs for mercy, it won't do them any good. I'll kill them if I can't find the child. The only other way to stop me is to kill the child. Then I'll have sensed it and calmed back down. But it would be too sad for me to handle."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"You need to know. I have to be contained, locked up, anything. Just keep me away from other people. You'll know when I'm about to give birth because during the last week of pregnancy, I'll go into a dormant state until it's time for the baby to come out. You'll know it when it happens, because I'll be locked inside a cocoon made purely of energy. As soon as you see it, call the police. Tell them it's urgent that I need to be kept in a room where my powers won't work. If you don't...then...I could...end up killing even you." I finished.

* * *

It had been eleven and a half months since I'd become pregnant. No one knew where I was or had tried to contact me in any way. Beast Boy remained by my side through it all, even the harshest and most relentless parts of it. Everyone shut their doors to us because they all knew I was pregnant with Slade's child. However, while things with us stayed the same, things were only getting worse at Titans' Tower. The group wouldn't leave Robin's side, but didn't agree with him in his decision to say horrible things so I would leave. After nearly six months of this nonesense, the group began to fall apart. They never realized just how much they needed me until now.

"I'm telling you, Raven's not evil!" Cyborg screamed.

"I didn't say she was! I said her baby was!" Robin retorted.

"How can a baby be evil? Are you even listening to yourself?" the cyborg said.

"Any kid who has Slade's genes would grow up to be just like his father!" Robin repeated.

"Not if a superheroine is takin' care of it!" Cyborg protested.

"Friends, please! We mustn't argue... Besides, it is best if we stay away from Raven. She obviously does not wish to see us." Starfire added.

"I bet if _SOMEONE_ were to say they're sorry, then everything would be okay again." Cyborg said, looking at Starfire but talking to Robin.

"Get off my case already! I'm a superhero, too, remember? It's my job to stop evil!" Robin screeched.

"Aw, naw! Here we go again with the evil thing! What is it gonna take for you to realize she's raising the baby?"

"I presume you think of Beast Boy as Raven's kicking of the side?" Starfire agreed.

"Okay stop! You," he said turning to Starfire, "shunned her. You," he said turning to Cyborg, "agreed with me and Star. I," he said pointing to himself, "said things."

"Yeah, that sounds about right, but what we did doesn't mean we _were_ right to do it!" Cyborg commented.

"Robin, do you not remember the time Raven made us deliscious pancakes? She made sure we were having a great day, because she knew it would make us happy. But can you recall a single time when we have done something solely for Raven? Beast Boy is the only one among us who is still with her; we cannot compare to him anymore. Those she knew as her friends viciously turned their backs to her, yet Beast Boy suffered with her. Perhaps it is time we, as Raven's friends, started thinking of what would make Raven happy, instead of thinking only of ourselves." Starfire suggested.

"We kept denying her leaving was our fault, when all of us were at fault. We were so mad, we were blinded. Blinded to what was really important. Now it's time to make up for that. It's time to drop Raven a line, man. What do you say?" Cyborg asked, turning to Robin.

"I say... I say her baby will still grow up to be evil." he started.

"AW! You-"

"But Raven's not evil. You were right; she didn't deserve what I said. I was blinded by the fact that she was carrying Slade's kid. And while I have an unbending hatred towards the child, I want to see my friend again." he finished.

Starfire and Cyborg smiled understandingly. It was time they all went to see Raven, and settle this thing once and for all.


	11. New Intelligence

-Chapter 11-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

I took a swift, almost invisible glance to the left. Something didn't feel as it was supposed to. I sensed danger, but I didn't know from where. There were numerous amounts of shady characters in which I'd been keeping close watch over. I was eight and a half months pregnant. In a mere week I would go into the dormant state that would transform my entire life. I needed to be prepared, and more importantly, I needed to be in a safe environment when I finally _did_ go into that state. I would be unable to break free of it, and therefore I needed temporary protection.

The state was probably meant to help Azurans conserve energy and gain the extra weight needed for the birthing process. Right now, however, finding a safe area was my utmost priority.

I'd dreaded this day for so long. About three months ago, I had a very detailed vision. It depicted my maternal instinct kicking in and my inability to control it. Now, I'll have you know that normally I'm very restrictive with my emotions. I kept them locked up inside me, and couldn't afford to let them loose due to collosal damage taking place lest they get hold of me. But by keeping them contained, I became very emotionally repressed. It was hardly my fault. Yet, if judgment served right, everything would eventually end up working out.

I snapped myself out of my thoughts and focused on the here-and-now. That's what really mattered, after all.

Beast Boy lead me into the safest, tidiest-looking gas station around. This desert town was creeping even me out, and he knew it. The only setback was, we had no idea of which direction the next town was. The people here seemed otherworldly, and isolated from other homosapien contact. What they chose to do with their lives didn't matter much to me, but I wasn't giving birth here. The only reason we were here in the first place was due to our desert experience. So let them do as they please.

I again snapped myself out of my thoughts. I really needed to work on thought-control.

"Raven, what do you want?" Beast Boy asked me.

I looked over the menu, ravenously searching for food other than cactus fruits. And then I found a burrito. As my eyes took in the beautiful sight, I began to notice things that had escaped me when I first scanned it. Things such as the steam rising up, nice and hot, and the way it was somewhat neatly folded so the ends wouldn't spill food all over me. Yes, this was the food for me.

"I'll have a burrito." I ordered.

Beast Boy looked over the menu, as I had, and thought for a moment before placing his own order.

"I'll just have anything tofu." he said.

The counter man just looked at him, his expression completely emotionless, as though his work life sucked and he was blaming us for it. After what seemed like ten good minutes, he told us there was no tofu in the store. It was rather blandly said, I might add.

"Then...is there any vegetables?" Beast Boy asked.

The man standing on the other side of the counter just glared. Wordlessly, he pointed over to the snack stand, where some dried fruit snacks laid. "It's the only plants we got, sonny boy." he lashed.

Beast Boy smiled nervously and headed over to the shelf where he pointed. Then he searched through the little selection of packaged fruits.

The counter man turned back to me. After casting a glance down at my abdomen, his expression seemed to soften.

"So," he said, his tone much different than it was before, "You're gonna be a mommy?"

Not knowing how else to respond to a fully-grown man calling me a 'mommy', I answered awkwardly, "Uh, yeah. I am."

I wondered why he didn't throw me out like all the others had. Was he different from them, or just plain oblivious?

"Is he the dad?" the man said, gesturing over towards the green changeling who was searching through fruit snacks.

I blushed hotly at this assumption. "Ah, no, no! We're just a couple of friends, nothing more. Especially not enough for a baby!"

"Oh, I see. What's your name, little lady?" he said, smiling kindly to me.

"Raven." I replied. "Nice to meet you."

The man didn't say 'Nice to meet you' back to me; instead his expression darkened by alot. "You need to go." he said.

"W-Why?" I asked, blissfully unaware of the dangers he would tell me about.

"You need to take that little friend of yours, and you need to run." he replied.

"Why?" I repeated.

Beast Boy came back gripping a bag of dried plums in his hand. "I'll have this." he ordered, oblivious to the conversation taking place.

The man ignored Beast Boy's presence and continued, "A villain, Slade, is after you and that child. He said something about an apprentice and a girl named Raven. That's you, isn't it?"

I nodded, eager to know what Slade wanted with my kid this early in its life.

"He called the police; said he claimed custody of the kid. Now the police are after you. And be warned: he told the police you were very dangerous, and that they should be prepared when facing you." he explained.

Beast Boy dropped the bag of fruit snacks and didn't hesitate to pull me out the door.

"Raven, what'd you do?" he asked me when we were a good distance from the town, completely out of sight and earshot.

"I-I don't know! I didn't do anything!" I panicked.

Beast Boy sensed how mentally distressed I was and stopped asking questions.

"Anyway," he said, "We need to find a safe place for you to go into that...what didja call it again?"

"Jenka. Jenka is the state of dormancy every pregnant Azuran woman must go through in order to conserve energy and thereby gain weight." I descripted.

"Uh...yeah. That thing. Let's go." Beast Boy said, hurrying along with his words.

He grabbed my hand and started pulling on it, but I resisted. Startled, he turned to me and tugged again. I still resisted. Finally he gave up.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Beast Boy, this'll never work." I sighed, "Once I reach that red zone, Jenka, I told you I had to be captured anyway. And now Slade is coming to take away the baby earlier than planned. It might be better if I just get caught by the police, to avoid too much harm done."

"No, Raven! We can make it through this!" he said, trying to be encouraging.

I smiled sadly. It was all over. We'd come this far for nothing. Might as well have stayed stranded in the desert. I wanted to tell him it would be different, that he was right. But that would've been a lie, and after all he's done for me, how could I lie to him? I myself wanted to know it was okay. But it's next to impossible to lie to yourself. So in essence, things would just go from bad to worse.

"Beast Boy, it was really exhilarating when you kept by my side, but now the time's up. I'm about to reach Jenka; in fact, I could reach it any second now; you have to go. I'll be alright. But you've got a life to live, and I can't bring myself to keep you from living it." I told him.

The poor guy just stood there, his expression saying he was heartbroken. "Don't do it, Raven..." he choked out in a strangled voice.

"Sorry, Beast Boy. But here's where we need to part ways. I'm sorry it has to end like this, but I can't end up hurting you or anyone else." I said.

Although he understood where I was coming from, and although his brain said it was logical to ditch me, his heart said to stay with me and protect me. But he knew, probably better than anyone, sometimes it was better to listen to your brain than your heart. Sometimes, when your heart is in turmoil, it can want things that just weren't reasonable or wise. It was often then that people screwed up and made the wrong decisions. And it was often then that lives could change for better or worse. In this instance, it would most likely change for the worse, because if he stayed, he'd get caught up in this mess.

"Okay." he complied.


	12. Jenka's Arrival

-Chapter 12-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

I nodded, thankful he wouldn't argue back. A fight was the last thing I needed right now, and he seemed to sense this. But as I silently watched his lowering expression, I realized maybe I should have handled this more delicately. A flood of emotions washed over me. I hated having to leave him. I liked him so, so much it was almost too painful to bear. Anger was pointed toward Slade. Understanding was pointed toward facts of life. Worry was for the rest of the world.

"Beast Boy, you know this is literally where we part paths. You can never see me again, and if I ever get free, promise me you'll run." I said sadly.

The changeling had no desire to answer me. His heart was too busy shattering at the thought of losing someone held in such high regard. It was pitiful just to watch, but this kind of pain would be nothing compared to the pain he would feel if he were to see me after the child was taken. And then he wanted to be there with me. He wanted to stand by me, but now knowing he couldn't...was too much.

"I just want you to know that..." I took a deep breath to try and calm myself and quell my emotions, if only for a minute or two. "...that I never wanted this to happen. I was never counting on Slade to come early, but I was counting on you to help me. And now, seeing you like this..." I stopped, not bothering to continue. He knew how I felt. He knew it was hard.

He slowly shifted his gaze over to me. His foresty eyes met mine. We stayed locked in a trance, waiting for the other to act upon some unthinkable impulse. But neither of us moved. For once I wasn't tired, but psychologically distressed. His mental state was probably no different.

"...It's not there..." he whispered, almost inaudibly.

"What's not there, Beast Boy?" I asked, our eyes still locked together.

"It doesn't matter, anyway." he said.

Our fixed stare was broken when Beast Boy chose that exact time to lower his eyes, trying to hide the feelings he felt from me. Life suddenly wasn't important to him anymore. Survival didn't matter anymore. Only one thing took center stage in his mind, and that one thing was me. He summoned every last ounce of his courage, if any remained by this point. He lifted his eyes again, and I saw wet trails on his cheeks and neck, leading up to his hardened and determined eyes.

"Beast Boy-" I began, but was abruptly stopped.

"Raven, all this time I've been traveling with you. I've been helping you and hoping..." He blinked a few times before continuing, unable to register what he was about to say. "...hoping you would eventually see me for what I really wanted you to. When I was with you, I learned more about you than I ever had. I gained knowledge that there was a whole other side to you that had previously escaped me." His tone sounded completely unlike him, but he dismissed my puzzled look and kept going. "But all this time I've been scared to ask what you've thought of me. I couldn't help but wonder if you learned a little about me, too, or if you still saw me as the lame dork who told humorousless jokes. But now, seeing how you're explaining things to me so smoothly, as though you're talking to yourself, I'm not scared anymore." He took just four swift steps toward me, until he was face-to-face with me, until his eyes looked into mine and his head was not inches from my own. "I know your powers can amplify due to your emotions. So I've been very careful not to upset you or disrupt your feelings in any way. But since you won't be here for much longer, I don't even care if I die." He leaned a little closer to me, sending butterflies fluttering in my stomach. "I want you to know I've matured alot since I first came with you. I've stepped up when you were vulnerable. And in all that time I've spent with you, I developed what I first thought to be an unexplainable mystery feeling." He and I both blushed hotly. My powers started to grab things and lift them up threateningly. But this didn't stop him from getting his point across. He took hold of my wrist and pulled my into an embrace which I didn't resist. My skin tingled with electricity. "And then it hit me. This feeling was more powerful than it was with Terra. And it was directed at you, which only meant I could be feeling love."

That did it. My powers struck out and lashed at anything within its reach. The items that served as a warning blew into pieces. Trees were uprooted and flung miles away. Leaves were scattered all over the place. But I didn't notice any of the collateral damage I was causing. This might be partial to the fact that Beast Boy's lips had already been tenderly placed over mine. It was a passionate kiss, not one that could be found in movies, and I was too busy cherishing it to care about anything else going on.

The shapeshifting hero didn't care about my powers, either. He wanted this for a long time, and needed to let me know this kind of information, about how he felt toward me, especially since I was going to have to leave. He needed to make this moment special; something he was sure I would never forget. He, too, became lost in the little invisible bubble we'd formed together. Any thought he may have had was most definitely about me.

Everything in the world just got further and further from me. I didn't dare make a movement, lest the trance be broken and all my problems would come back to me, not unlike a boomerang. Instead, I paid close attention to the way his heart pounded in his chest, causing my emotions to roil in my belly. I inhaled his scent that was his and his alone. No one else had been that intoxicating. Not even Malchior had accomplished the feat Beast Boy had just now. He was truly something else.

In return, the green former hero made no movement either. He was far too busy lavishing the moment to ruin this special occasion. He would let nothing interfere with this kiss. Not after it had taken him so long to get this far with me. He needed me, and he would make sure I knew it. Nothing but me could snap him out of his reverie.

Though I didn't care much, I felt my cheeks turn puce with my now-rocketing blood pressure. The background of the landscape utterly ceased to exist. It seemed the more I prolonged this kiss, the more objects were led from my focus. Everything now seemed ethereal in my mind. It felt like my mind was the only thing working at this point. Everything else was void of limberness and activity. Meanwhile, the both of us were in a shadow of nothing.

Finally, Beast Boy pulled away with much reluctance. "You know, they say the rarest flowers only bloom at night because people aren't watching; they want to be mysterious." he said, brushing aside some of my stray hair strands as he did.

"You want me to stay." I registered, not out of my rouse yet.

"I bet if I pluck just the right flower, she'll bloom for me even in sunlight." he continued.

"I'm the flower?" I asked, still dazed from what had just occurred.

"Yeah." he replied.

I had no idea what else to say. I wasn't familiar with this romantic stuff. And although I still had the same emotions as someone in love, I didn't know how to show it. How did one go about this? I was always the person you asked about borrowing a book or how meditation worked. But romance? Those scenarios were beyond me. Though I'd felt what Beast Boy had wanted me to feel, I had no way of telling him it worked, and that I'd felt the same way about him. I mentally cursed myself for being so emotionally repressed. Inside, I was as happy as the sun in a baby's cartoon. But on the outside, I was expressionless.

Beast Boy was completely unable to read me. It was clear he was at a loss. Had I gotten what he was trying to say? Or had I been so dense I hadn't realized it yet? For all he knew, either of these could have been the truth. I had always been hard to understand, but this was insanity! Perhaps a rose could seal the deal...but there weren't any rose gardens or floral shops around here.

New emotions overwhelmed me in one massive wave. These feelings were new to me; I'd never felt them before. I desperately needed to clarify some things, namely the new sensations, but I had no means of doing so. I didn't know what to do with these emotions. I didn't know if they were good or bad. I didn't know whether I should discard them or keep them. The fact of Beast Boy's feelings towards me was flattering, unnerving, frustrating, and terrifying all at the same time.

The nerve-wracking silence grew heavier between the two of us. Though I could easily just tell him how I felt, for some reason I couldn't. My voice failed me, and I couldn't talk at all. This only served to deepen the nervous atmosphere.

Then a bitter-sweet moment happened. Pools of energy whirled around me, and I was lifted a few feet above the ground. I knew I had to tell Beast Boy what was happening, but my voice still failed me. The nervous atmosphere grew denser upon adding worry to the situation. In mere seconds I was filled with fatigue, and my vision blurred before I went into complete unconsciousness. The energy spanned around me and hardened, encasing me in a black cocoon. No one could see inside, nor could I see out. Jenka had arrived.

An emotional cocktail filled the nervously worrying changeling. He didn't know how to direct this situation, but he remembered my words to him. _"Jenka. Jenka is the dormant state every pregnant Azuran woman must got through in order to conserve energy and thereby gain weight." "You'll know when it happens because I'll be surrounded by a cocoon made of pure energy." _I wasn't kidding, as Beast Boy just now realized. I meant every word of it. The cocoon was harder than even diamond. It wouldn't be easily broken. I had the necessary protection, but the hero felt it wasn't enough.

Deciding to take matters into his own hands, he transformed into a pterodactyl and plucked my cocoon gently off the land with his dinosaur beak, using his teeth to grip the smooth, slippery substance he was holding. But after he was done with his 'dramatic' scene, he didn't know what to do. That is, until he saw blue and red lights flashing and heard sirens screaming. Naturally he flew off with just a swift beat of his wings. Time to run.


	13. Battling Authority

-Chapter 13-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

I looked behind me only to find authoritative-looking vans trailing me. They were solid black, with large, movable headlights and darkly-tinted windshields. They were definitely all-terrain vehicles if they could catch up to us this easily. On top of the vans were the lights I'd seen flashing. Sirens could still be heard as a person pulled out a megaphone and spoke into it.

"Drop the fugitive! If you do not comply to our demands, we'll be forced to press serious charges!" a female's voice said, amplified by the loudspeaker installed in the megaphone.

They knew who I was, otherwise they'd just be trying to capture me and take Raven. But either way, I wasn't about to let them have her. I beat my membranous wings several times and ascended into the clouds, higher than they could see. I was very precarious not to drop my precious cargo. Though I knew just how thick and hard the walls of her encasing were, I refused to let them try to break it open. The mere thought of them succeeding in harming her while Raven was still in such a delicate and complicated state was overbearing. And therefore I wouldn't allow her capture.

Unfortunately, most stories don't go without a major setback or complication. Well, this one was no different. I unexpectedly found myself caught in an electrified net which I was unsure if I could escape. I looked forward and saw ground, and then I knew I was falling. I had only seconds to devise a plan.

I shifted into a muskrat and slipped through the weaving. I then proceeded to morph into a robin, as it was the first flying object to come to mind, and waited for Raven's enclosure to hit the ground. As I watched her fall, I felt nervous even though I knew she'd be okay. I waited until just the right moment...before changing into a pterodactyl again and swooping down to catch her, the net already having slid off her upon impacting the ground.

I regained my initial altitude and smirked inwardly. They had no business meddling in a hero's affairs. If it was the last thing I did, I would show them. And while doing so, I would prove Raven's innocence. Apparently Slade was behind this, probably enjoying the chase as he watched it from afar. Letting the good guys do the dirty work was so like him...

I looked down, even though I knew it would do me no good. The numerous clouds were obscuring the authorities from my view. But the opposite was also true, unless they had thermal vision. Although I highly doubted they'd be _that_ prepared for the presumptively chaotic Raven, I keep my guard up. Now I had a good idea of what I was going up against. I couldn't hurt them because they were the good guys that were mislead by Slade, and they were going to be difficult to flee from, given their astoundingly futuristic technology. But unless they had a helicopter or a sniper rifle, they weren't getting close to me. They weren't stupid, they knew their electric nets weren't effective against me. That said, I shouldn't have much trouble with those in the future.

I shifted my package in my fanged beak. My birdlike tongue ran over the walls of Raven's cocoon, searching for any slightest little crack, chip, or scratch. There was none. Knowing this fact relieved me. I stopped messing around with my luggage. I had some serious work to do if I was going to keep Raven safe.

I glanced down at what I carried. Though it was black, it looked violet in the warm sunlight. And I could even see Raven when I held it to the sun. She was safely sleeping. One thing that hadn't escaped me, though, was the disturbing fact that she was submerged in some kind of fluid. Perhaps it was similar to amniotic fluid, since she still needed the nutrition attained throughout each day. It was much like looking at a bug trapped in amber.

The definite sound of a gunshot brought my attentions back to reality. I was now considered a wanted criminal. The bullet, surprisingly enough, whizzed past my head. Thankfully it had missed me by decimeters. But why would it even come close? Weren't they shooting blindly? Or could my cautions be confirmed in the fact that they do, indeed, have a thermal allocator? If that was the case then the only one flying blind was me. They, on the other hand, had the advantage. Not knowing what else to do until I could shake them, I zigzagged and loop-de-looped. I did everything I could think of to avoid the countless shells rocketing toward me, threatening to take my very life.

And then finally, what I'd been waiting for, the barrage of led pieces stopped altogether. Either they'd run out or were reloading. Whichever the case, I was free. Temporarily, at least. I was smart enough to know I hadn't yet lost them and they were probably still following me. I was grateful and took the opportunity to fly higher. Gentle couldn't apply to this situation, but I tried to be as gentle as I could for the sake of my dormant friend.

Acting upon sudden impulse, I beat my wings again and rose higher into the sky. This was higher than I'd ever flown before. By now I was completely free from the clouds that had been previously surrounding me. Raven was safely secured in my beak, and I intended to keep it that way. The oxygen up here was thinning dramatically. I couldn't fly any higher or I'd suffocate. I used a natural avian instinct to measure the oxygen levels. There was hardly enough of the needed substance to sustain me much longer. If Raven needed air, she couldn't get too much of it up here. Reluctantly, I glided downward a bit. I was still not in the clouds, but skimming above them. Now oxygen was slightly more abundant.

Another ordeal happened in which I was unprepared for. A huge clump of metal came within inches of my left wing. When I looked to see just what the metal was, I found it to be none other than what looked like a miniature, much slimmer version of a rocket. What was more worrying was that it started chasing me! I banked right, and the little projectile missed. But when it came right back, I began to get frightened. This wasn't an ordinary missile; this was a heat-seeking missile! But having to stoop to this device meant the users hadn't come equipped with thermal vision of any kind, the exception being this little explosive. They probably had no clue where I was at and relied on their trump card, or so I assumed it was a trump card, to get me for them. As if; that wasn't going to happen in their wildest dreams, let alone in real life!

The missile launched itself at me again, and again I had to dodge. It had come closer this time, though. I'd felt the draft as it passed me. I flew lower at the next round, into the clouds. I was praying their dense humidity would both serve to cool me off and block the 'view' of the mechanism chasing me. With the two elements combined, I may just be able to lose it.

But it didn't work. The high-tech equipment flew at me again, even through the dense jungle of whiteness. Unfortunately, I could hardly see it coming and turned right in time. It caught my foot, but dealt no life-threatening damage to me. Though it hurt badly, I was hoping the heat stored in my blood would throw the weapon off course.

That, too, failed to work. There wasn't enough heat in my blood for the sensors to detect it. Luckily, that gave me a flawless idea. The simple fact was the heat seeking missile was searching for heat. But it only had a limited range in which it could detect heat. Unable to outrun it, if I could briefly turn into something with little to no heat, like my blood, then I would undoubtedly be safe. My only real concern was Raven. Sure, the barrier she was contained in was seemingly unbreakable, but if it were to be damaged by something with as much raw power as the projectile, then the dormant state she was currently in could be very easily upset. I didn't know this for sure, but I didn't want to find out.

And then my problems were solved. If I just flew lower, closer to the ground, and morphed near something with more heat, then the tiny rocket would be thrown entirely at the new target. It was so simple! Now, the only setback was how to get close to the ground, and how to get close to whatever had more heat than me.

I ducked at the missile's interference and plunged earthward. The missile was hot on my tail. I didn't have long to find and object to which I could guide the weapon. But then it hit me: the cops. I immediately picked out the vans. They were going full speed, and it seemed I had gained more distance between them and me than I first thought. This worked perfectly to my bidding. In fact, those large vehicles produced so much heat, I wouldn't have to shapeshift at all! I could just bring to warhead within inches of them, and instead of me being its target, the heat would automatically lock in new coordinates.

I stiffened my wings and spread them just a bit. Once I was directly above the first van in sight, I clawed the top, allowing its force to thrust me back up into the air. The missile, on the other hand, had no such luck with that. Unlike a living organism, it couldn't control itself and made contact with the automobile. I flapped my wings ever harder to escape the inevitable explosion that was to occur.

The blast was heard even at a distance. The other vans were forced to stop in their tracks, to assist the battered vehicle. I didn't care much at all for what they did, but I hoped everyone was okay. If I'd killed someone, I could not only get in serious trouble, but I would have who-knows-how many families to explain myself to. I highly doubted those families would believe I was falsely accused.

I flew until I was sure I was at a safe distance away from the scene of the crime. Then I landed. With much pain, I might add. My foot obtained a gash from the battle with the projectile. It was furiously bleeding, and it was darn near excruciating to stand on. The gash went right under my foot and just tipped at my big toe. I morphed back into a human and let out an agonized groan I'd been holding in.

Then I remembered Raven. She was the focus now; she needed me more than ever. She was why I got this gash, but it was well worth it. I put a hand to her strong barrier. It was somewhat cold. I didn't worry much, because Raven's room back at Titans' Tower was always cold. Well, colder than anyone else's. This might be her most comfortable temperature. So I left it alone. I took my hand off of it and sat there. The enclosure glistened with water droplets in the sun. It was beautiful, actually. And the best part was, it perfectly matched my thoughts of her.

My pain was forgotten as I talked to her, knowing she wouldn't speak back. But since she was unconscious, I was hoping to influence a dream. Somewhere she could be truly safe, if just for once. Somewhere where her problems would fade away into nothingness. Somewhere where she could be happy for even a moment. That would be glorious. A place where reality can be defied and fantasy is law. A place like that was where she needed to be, given all she's been through.

I continued on with my one-sided conversation until I got bored. Then I laid down beside Raven, as I had all those night before she was like this, and drifted off into a nightmareful slumber.


	14. Beast Boy's Dream

-Chapter 14-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

Everything was dark and eerie. My instincts were telling me to beat it. I needed to get out, but where would I go? Everything was dark and pitch-black. I could see nothing in front of me, nor anything behind. My first thought was that I was blind. I foolishly let panic take over, and I ran forward. But before I knew it, I was halted by a hard substance.

A light flickered, and my surroundings were illuminated. Metal bars began to solidify. _Those_ bars were what I'd hit. _They_ were the things containing me. I tried to transform into any animal, as long as it was something other than human, but I couldn't. I was stuck as a human, and I couldn't even begin to fathom why.

As the light grew brighter, more of my surroundings could be seen more clearly. I was in a cage and I was around three feet tall. I was just a little kid without any such transformation powers. Other little boys and girls were in cages near my own. They were crying and screaming to be let free. I seemed to be the only calm one. Some of the other kids rattled their rickety cage bars, but to no avail. My own bars were rusting, and I did try to rattle them. I succeeded in rattling, but not breaking. Like the other little ones, I was trapped and completely alone.

Everything quieted when heavy footsteps were heard thumping throughout the halls. The cage on top of mine, which had been the noisiest before, now stood still and silent. I looked to my left and right. The little boys next to me were shrinking back in fear. I watched their actions in utter bewilderment. What exactly was there to fear?

A man in a white lab coat appeared before me and smiled a toothy grin. Something about him seemed...familiar. Yet at the same time I, too, was just as terrified as the little ones next to me. I knew the ones next to me. They were my adopted siblings. The one above me was my biological little sister. Somehow I knew these things. Somehow I knew to be petrified of the man dressed in white.

"Now, don't worry. This time it shouldn't hurt." the man said, his voice deep and unlovable.

The exact opposite of euphoria came over me. I knew what was coming, and at the same time I didn't know. Dread took place of confusion.

"Uh-" the man glanced down at the notepad he carried before continuing, "-Garfield, isn't it? It's time."

I didn't resist as the man unlocked my cage and picked me up. For some unknown reason, I wasn't at all inclined to run away. Perhaps it was just futile. Maybe I knew that, and maybe that's why I didn't resist. Instead, I held onto the collar of his shirt as he carried me down the hallway.

He turned right upon reaching a fork in the paths. Then he turned left. At an intersection, he just kept going straight. Then he came across a dead-end hallway that contained two doors on each side, and then a door that said "CAUTION!" in the middle.

The one that said "CAUTION!" was the one I was carried in to. The other doors said "TESTING" and I had no idea what the rooms behind them looked like. But the 'caution' room looked like a surgery room. A glass window was suspended on each side of the four walls. There was absolutely no escape. People were behind the glass window, though I didn't pay any attention to what they looked like. I was set on a hard, cold metal table. Operating tools were next to me on a separate, much smaller table.

Those whom I presumed to be doctors or surgeons moved the operation tools away. Thank God they weren't going to use those on me. They brought in a different table from out of the corner. On it was many long, big needles with different serums in different needles. Most of them were big, but a few smaller ones could be spotted.

I sat, not bothering to even _try_ to run. I sat almost as though this was a normal, everyday thing. Was it? I didn't know any differently, so I assumed it must be normal. I saw my siblings, both adopted and biological, be carried in the same room with me. This delighted me. I was happy to have my siblings all in one place out of our cages. But it wasn't playtime. It never was. They were set on tables just like the one I was on.

The doctors each picked up a needle and injected us at the same time with its contents. They picked up another one, and another. Until they'd used about six needles already.

One of my siblings, a boy, started to cough and groan. His eyes glazed over and he collapsed. Many doctors rushed to aid him, but they said something about it being 'too late'. Then they ordered the continuation of the experiment. The others agreed, and started back with their actions.

My biological sibling, my little sister, also started to deteriorate when they got to about seventeen needles. It was too late for her and another child that had also been brought in. Once they got to exactly twenty needles, one more kid passed away. Another needle was inserted, and the room filled with pain as four more subjects obtained the status of 'deceased'. More needles were pricked into our skin. Yet more died for the simple satisfaction of these horrible scientists. They kept going with the needles, until only I and one other remained.

The other child was a boy my age. He looked at me, as if to congratulate me on my cheating death. I looked back tiredly. I didn't sleep, though, fearing if I did, I would also die.

The scientists smiled and chatted among themselves. A bunch of chemicals were spoken of here, a new idea spoken of there. It sickened me. I decided this was enough.

"Why are you doing this?" I asked, oblivious of the reason I was here.

"Garfield, Garfield... You should be happy; you passed the test!" a female doctor exclaimed.

"But those other kids-"

"Are in a better place now." she interrupted me. "Now you should probably get some sleep, Garfield. You'll find that tomorrow you'll be a whole new person."

I furrowed my eyebrows and frowned. The anger inside me grew as other scientists examined the only other boy alive after that experiment. In mere seconds I changed, unknowingly, into a raptor. I roared, catching everyone's attention. In return, they marveled at how I could transform as such. The other boy roared back at me. He was a raptor as well. He, too, was also unhappy about the situation. We ran up to each other and spoke in a different language that was unknown to humans. It was the language of raptors. It sounded just like a bunch of chittering, but it was more than that.

The scientists, upon seeing how easily we could control our newfangled powers, grew intimidated. We could beat them to a bloody pulp if we wanted, and they knew it all too well. A few of the men lunged for us and attempted to hold us down for further analysis.

Both of us turned into a T-Rex. We looked at each other encouragingly before stomping on one particular scientist. He was the man who had carried me into this place. We began getting out of control. The scientists tried tazing us, but it was ineffective. We were far more powerful than they, and we knew it. We continued rampaging around, until all of the doctors had fled.

Then I headbutted one of the walls. It only led to another room. All scientists fled, again, and I kept knocking down walls until I came into a room I'd never seen before.

The ceiling was blue, with white, puffy things painted on it. Except they were moving. There was a hidden fan somewhere, because I felt air blowing on me. I morphed back into a human when I saw green of varying shapes and shades mounted on tall brown things. The same air seemed to be moving the tiny shades of green. Underneath me was more green. In a few spots, there were green stalks and on top of them were colorful blades sprouting from the same center. Where was I?

My new friend came up beside me and he, too, transformed back to a human.

"Wow." he said cheerfully. "Where are we?"

"I don't know. But I like this place! Wanna see how big it is?" I asked, referring to the 'room' I was in.

"Okay." he answered.

Before either of us could even come close to taking our first step into the outside world, at which we didn't know was outside, alarms rang throughout the facility. The sheer tone of it was flat-out deafening. Both my friend and I dropped to our knees, covering our ears with our hands. We didn't turn into an animal, for we knew what was awaiting us. We'd just gotten ourselves into serious trouble. Hopefully, if we stayed put, nothing too bad would happen to us.

Scientists came flooding out of the establishment and rushing to us. They were saying things about us, like to be careful around us and to be gentle with us because we'd just come out of the experiment. They picked us up and put us in our cages.

I was delighted to discover that my friend was in the cage right across from mine.

But then, right after the fairly short scene, a woman came to us, dressed in light blue compared to the others, which dressed in white. She pulled out a butcher's knife.


	15. A Ghost from the Past

-Chapter 15-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

I awoke screaming and in a cold sweat. I'd been having that dream over and over now, but it hadn't progressed that far before. This time, the recurring nightmare was about me as a little kid, and in a...what was I in, anyway? Was it an experimental place? Human experimentation? And what was with my 'siblings'? Could that have been a mere illusion conjured up by my subconscious? Or was that...no, that couldn't have been a memory, or else I'd remember more of it, like how I got into the Doom Patrol. Come to think of it, I couldn't remember much of my own past at all. I remember quitting the Doom Patrol and joining the Teen Titans, but right there; that was where my memory ended. I had absolutely no idea what happened before that.

A familiar screaming sound filled the air, naturally leading me to look up. A flock of feathered companions filled the skies. It was far too dark outside to identify what kind of birds they were, but they were probably related to common blackbirds. Blackbirds were a social group of birds, so it was no shocker to hear them chattering about migration patterns and whatnot.

Seeing them, though, made me wish I had a real family to go home to. Sure, the Titans were my family, but they weren't the same a mother and a father. And maybe a little sister would be nice. I sighed. Surely I had to have been born to _someone_. But who? Did something happen to them when I was young and couldn't comprehend what was going on, therefore unable to remember it? I didn't know.

A different screeching sound was carried with the wind. Almost free of my will, I transformed into a pterodactyl to seek out this intruder. Raven was currently out of my focus. I was unable to produce enough thrust to lift me from the earth because of the wound on my foot. It was still as painful as ever. I called out in sheer agony.

My call was heard by the mystery visitor, and I received a call that said, "Just wait; I'll be there in a moment!". And in just under a minute, another pterodactyl landed right beside me, just as stunned to see me as I was to see it.

Though it was too dark to identify birds, the undeniable form of a pterodactyl couldn't be mistaken for anything else. I morphed into a T-Rex and toppled over from he same injury that kept my from becoming airborne.

The pterodactyl had a shocked look on its face when it saw my transformation. It, to my surprise, changed from an ancestor of birds to a boy my age. This made me turn into a human as well.

"G-Garfield? Is that really you?" a male's voice whispered in a slight English accent. "It's been so long!"

The shapeshifter walked out from the shadows, allowing me to study his features. Unlike me, he wasn't green. He was a light-brown color. His hair was a darker shade of brown, like mine was a darker shade of green. He had a fang protruding from his lower lip, just like my fang. Obviously he morphed into was, as most people were, a few inches taller than me.

"C'mon, don't I get a 'how-do-you-do?'" he continued.

Wordlessly, he lifted me up with a huge greeting-hug. Meanwhile, I was as confused as Ozzie Osbourne and Michael Jackson combined. Why was this stranger hugging me?

"Uh, do I know you?" I asked.

He pulled away and let go of me. "You mean you don't remember me? Ah, that's no surprise, actually. Should've expected this. I had been told of your amnesia, but I thought you may be able to regain your memories. Looks like I was wrong."

"Amnesia? Memories? What on earth are you-"

"It's okay. In fact, it's kind of funny. I know you, yet you don't know me!" he added.

I began to back away slowly, starting to get concerned about this psycho maniac.

He glanced at me and laughed. "Hey, now, I'm not a stalker. You, my friend, came into _my_ turf. Not the other way around."

Then I remembered Raven. Couldn't leave without her. "Um, I'm sorry; I'll just take my friend and be leaving now."

He sighed, as though disappointed. "It's alright. If you want, you can stay awhile. I mean, I hadn't come here in a long time. I was going to pass by here, but I saw a big cloud of fire; flew over as soon as I could. I searched all over for where that fire was, hoping to put it out. Instead, I found you!"

"And...you know me because...?" I said, expecting him to finish off my sentence.

"Well, I didn't expect you'd forget _that_ much. We were the only two survivors after an experiment to infuse human and animal DNA. We managed to get free, but then got captured again. Then a savior came along and freed us from our cages." he explained.

"Hey," I said, realizing something, "That sounds like the dream I just woke up from." And then I lowered my voice, so as not to wake Raven. "But we have to keep it down; Raven's still sleeping."

"Raven?" he whispered, making sure to keep his voice low, "Who's Raven? And where is she?" He looked around and shrugged.

I pointed to Raven's energy barrier. "She's in there."

He examined it thoroughly. He observed every little detail there was to find. The way half of it reflected the rays of the moonlight, its color, even the girl resting inside. His breath caught in his throat as he looked at the silhouette of her face. He noticed how still she was.

"Is she okay? I've never seen anything like this before." he said, almost inaudibly.

"Yeah, she's fine. She said it was normal for her to be like this, and I had no choice but to trust her judgment." I answered, steadily watching his every move.

He turned to me and smiled. "You must really like her."

I blushed and looked away. Not that this was embarrassing to admit or anything, but I never told someone I was in love before. That made it all the harder to tell this stranger. Raven was, in my eyes, the only thing that mattered. Once the baby was born, though, she said I would see a side to her I wouldn't want to. But that strengthened my resolve to run away with her and continue protecting her from Slade's evil clutches. She didn't deserve to be tormented as such, and therefore I wouldn't allow the child to be taken from her.

The mystery person only grinned wider. This was truly something of the cinemas. "So, about that dream you said you had..."

My head shot up at this mention. I had told him his description's relation to my dream, but how did he know about it? What were his ties to my nightmare? So many questions similar to these swam in my head, infiltrating my thoughts.

"...Were you a little boy in a big building? And doctors were there?" he asked.

I nodded, thinking I may know where this was going. So I began telling him everything that happened in my realm of subconscious thoughts. The process took around ten minute, partly because I had to remember it all. But when I was done, he nodded understandingly.

"That, Garfield is what's known as a flashback." he stated, confirming my assumptions. "And that other little boy you talked about? That was me, Rudy."

"I thought that might be where you were going. And if it is a flashback, then it makes sense why you'd know me. But how come I don't know you?" I asked.

"Well, after we were freed by that one woman, we ran as far away as we could. A few years later, we decided to try to be superheroes due to our powers. You joined a group known as the Doom Patrol, whereas I tried it solo. We checked up on each other fairly often. Life was good and usually pretty easy. But that all changed when you were fighting a supervillain known as 'the Brain'. You were fighting him, and I was there with you. But you made a huge mistake turning into a mouse to try to stall his technology. Though you succeeded in destroying the weapon he was creating, his henchman punched you through a wall when you came out of the machine. You were hurt too badly to stay conscious, and as a result you developed amnesia. The next day, you had no idea who any of us were. The Doom Patrol agreed to take you in as your family. I, on the other hand, wanted to sightsee. I went to a whole different continent, but promised to one day come back. Once you were back to full health, you were fighting again. You had no memory of our times together, though. You and the Doom Patrol continued fighting against the Brain. All the time you were unaware that I even existed. You, Garfield, were the only family I can ever remember having. Today was supposed to be the day I came back from sightseeing, but it looks more like you found me, and less like I found you." he explained.

After that whole story was finished, I couldn't even speak. I just sat there, not able to remember anything that he had told me happened. I was hardly able to believe my own ears. But something deep down was telling me what he said was true, that it all really did happen.

"Unfortunately, and you probably don't remember this, you gained a new power, as the Doom Patrol informed me. Apparently, there's something...different about you. At first, I thought those needles didn't do anything to you but give you strange powers. I was wrong; horribly wrong. On the same day you woke up from your slumber, you morphed into a different, unknown animal. It had the head of a wolf, the arms of a gorilla, the tail of a fox, the body of a lion, the hands of a bear with exceptionally long, sharp, and bendable claws, and the legs of a three-toed dragon. It was aweful. It snarled and growled menacingly. Supposedly it tore the hideout to shreds, and the Doom Patrol had to find another one. After some mental therapy, the creature was locked inside you. Psychic barriers were put up in order to quell the beast's attempts to free itself. But we don't know how long they'll hold." he added.

"I didn't, you know...kill anyone, did I?" I asked.

"No, thankfully. But they said if you were left in that state for much longer, you very well would've." Rudy answered.

I lowered my gaze to the floor. This wasn't good; I'd had dreams about turning into a monster before, but now that it may come true, I was scared for everyone's life. If Rudy was right about all this, which he probably was, then for all I knew, I could turn into a monster at any given moment!


	16. A Nightmare Come to Life

-Chapter 16-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

I snapped out of the shocked daze I'd been put in. Now entangled in a web of messes from which I could not escape, I could do nothing more than look at Rudy, who was patiently waiting for me to respond. I knew he was worried about me, but I didn't want him to be. If I hadn't turned into a mouse for the sake of battling, then I would have all my memories. But then a different thought occurred, a more positive one. If I _hadn't_ lost my memory; if I _hadn't_ developed amnesia, I might never have had a chance to join the Teen Titans. That said, I would never have met Raven.

The possibility of me not meeting Raven could've been very high if I hadn't lost my past. It wouldn't have hurt me only because I never knew. But if I'd know she existed and I hadn't met her even once, that would kill me. I would probably unable to find a reason to live. Lately, my whole life had revolved around her and her safety. I didn't want that to change. Ever.

My mind made up, I smiled at Rudy.

In return, he frowned. "Why are you smiling? I want you to be happy, but after the news I just gave you..."

"Because if I hadn't lost my memory that day, I might not have ever met Raven." I answered truthfully.

He grinned and nodded his head in a very understanding manner. He knew where I was coming from. Everything happened for a reason. And my reason was just as good as anyone else's. Though he didn't have a girlfriend, he knew what it was like to be in love.

"Yeah. My girlfriend died a while back. I tried to save her, but... Let's just say some things aren't enough." he said, sorrow and regret lacing each word. "Now I know she's watching me from Heaven, because she was already an angel to begin with."

"That's rough, dude. I'm sorry. Raven's my angel. I didn't realize it before, but I guess she always has been." I replied.

He did nothing more than smile. "I wonder if she can hear you while she's inside that thing." He gestured over to the black encasing that was Raven's temporary protection.

* * *

The moon was lowering, and I still hadn't gotten any sleep. It was pretty difficult with such pain eating at my abused foot.

I looked back over at Raven's confinement. It would be nicer if she were free, but if this was necessary, then I wouldn't stand in the way. Even covered by a dark veil, she still glowed with beauty. I thought of her, as I usually did, and blushed.

After assuring myself that Rudy was snoozing, I limped pitifully to Raven's curtain of energy. I pecked it ever so slightly with a kiss and told her a story I used to tell myself in the Doom Patrol every night before I went to bed. It was my version of a bedtime story, and it meant alot to me since it was one of the few remaining memories of my childhood.

"Once upon a time, there was a lonely dog. He was constantly saving people with his superpower, a super bark. It could annihilate anything within a ten-foot upper radius. But because of this power, people became scared of the dog. He tried to act cute and cuddly to tell them he wasn't harmful to them, but the townspeople ignored this fact and grew even more frightened. Unfortunately, the dog couldn't talk in human speech. It continued its superheroing, hoping the townspeople would see he wasn't going to hurt them. But they still refused to accept the reality. He was the world's first and only superhero, so people didn't trust him. He got really sad because of this, and ran away from the town. But then an evil supervillain came into the town upon hearing of the dog's disappearance. Without the dog to protect them, the whole town was enslaved by the villain. Unable to break free of the wrong done to them, they called out for the dog every day. And finally, the dog heard them. He was happy they wanted him back, and rushed to save them. He fought back the villain with his bark, and the town was finally free. The town elders thanked him generously. They told him he could stay in the town as long as he wanted and that the people would treat him as their own admirable pet every day, instead of a frightful monster. The dog was grateful for this, and he agreed to stay. And from that day on, the people have been visiting a shrine they built for him in recognition of his heroism. The villain was eternally locked up, and the both dog and town were eternally free." I said.

I sighed. I wished that were my life straight from the start. True, the hardships I suffered were important in allowing me to realize my full potential in life, but what would happen if everything went perfectly? Was there even such a thing as perfect anymore? I may never know this, but for now, things seemed okay between me and Raven. And Rudy, of course. Perhaps he could even help us out. Before now, I'd been protecting Raven all on my own. But now that Slade was becoming involved, I needed more help.

A vicious thought struck me. What if, just out of imagination, I let out this 'creature' locked inside me? With such devastating power this thing must possess, I could very well be invincible! To scare even the Doom Patrol on first glance... That was truly awe-inspiring. If I let this thing out, maybe I wouldn't need the help of Rudy. That would be great, because I still had my dignity, and I honestly didn't want his help.

I began concentrating really hard on the 'psychic barriers' that had supposedly been put up. Once I located them, I proceeded to weaken them to astonishingly low levels. But breaking them was impossible. If this guy wanted out, he was gonna have to help me extinguish this mental crap I was dealing with.

A voice rudely interrupted my concentration.

"Garfield! You aren't trying to let that monster out, are you?" Rudy said, fear evident in his voice.

I shot back to reality. "Uh, why? I mean, I know I don't remember it then, but I bet if I could turn into that thing _now_-"

"No!" he shouted, waking several startled birds and frogs. "You don't understand, Garfield. If that creature were to get out, _you_ wouldn't be controlling _it. It_ would be controlling _you_."

I waved my hand loosely and dismissively. "Yeah, right. I can handle the largest dinosaur in history; I'm positive I can handle this one extra animal."

Worry crossed with frustration, and he grabbed my shoulders and shook my violently. "Garfield, I'm telling you this for your own safety! Whatever you do, _don't_ let that beast out of you! You're the _only_ thing keeping it from slaughtering us all!"

"You said I didn't kill anyone last time I transformed, so why would now be different?" I asked, eager to know just for the sake of knowing.

"T-That's true... But think about it this way: It's the perfect predator. It's got fangs unlike anything you've ever seen. It's definitely carnivorous. One clean swipe of its claws can break a bone! Surely you can't expect everyone to be okay with _that_ running amuck!" he protested.

**He's right, you know.**

I scanned the surrounding area. Nothing there... Still slightly worried, I brushed off the foreign, growling voice I'd just heard. I was probably so tired my mind was messing with me. Just wait; next I'd start hallucinating.

Rudy, having the same instincts I do, sensed the momentary distress coming from me. He didn't have to say a single word; his expression told me all I needed to know. He was wondering what was wrong with me. Honestly I myself didn't know the answer.

"I'm fine." I assured him.

**Wrong again, Garfield. He was right; you're far to weak to handle the sheer power I possess. However, I think we can reach a happy medium. Whatsay you let me out of this imprisonment, and I give you my power? Of course, you must realize first that this would mean I would need a host to take form of.**

"And that host is me?" I asked, accidentally spewing our conversation out loud. I glanced and Rudy's expression horrified.

**Well, you're more knowledgeable than I first thought. But indeed, the host would be you. Though you would not retain your current form, you would gain so much! Just imagine what kind of havoc you and I could wreak on this miserable planet! You could finally get back at those terrible people who dared to change your molecular structure.**

"What? No way! I wanted your power for good, not evil!" I implied.

**Ah, yes. Good, right. I understand completely, Garfield. However, you've already succeeded in weakening the confinement holding me inside. I could come out at any given moment. **

"Well, not now! Those barriers might be weak, but you're still trapped. That alone tells me enough. You can't get free." I said rather smugly.

**Don't get cocky. If you would like to test your self-presumed theory, I would be _more_ than happy to oblige.**

I stalled. Testing that theory...may not be the best idea I've ever had. I needed time to devise a plan. Either that, or wait until Raven could renew the barriers. But Rudy was right; this thing would be too much for me to handle, ad there fore it would take over my conscience, replacing it with its own.

"I still think you're bluffing. Otherwise you'd have already come out." I finally decided.

**And _that_ is your big finale? If you so desperately wish for my freedom-**

"No!" I screamed. "No! I... I don't want you to come out."

Rudy laid a hand over my shoulder. "Is it manifesting itself to you?" he asked.

"What does 'manifesting' mean?" I replied, answering a question with a question.

"What did it say?" he continued.

"It...said it wants out. It said it could already get out if it wanted." I answered.

"I see. It's had all this time to hone its abilities..." Rudy trailed off in deep thought.

I turned back to Raven, greatly fearing her safety. I promised to protect her, but now... Now I've as good as let that _thing_ loose. I should've listened to Rudy. Then Raven would still be safe and I go keep living without worrying about this creature popping out at who-knows-when. And worse, it wanted meat, I could tell. And where did meat come from? Animals, including humans. Which could very well include Rudy and Raven.

What's more, I had Slade to worry about. Then there was the authorities... I could hardly afford another problem right now. I _needed_ Rudy's assistance, dignity or not.


	17. Feelings Anew

-Chapter 17-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

The morning sun shone brightly, penetrating the forces of my eyelids. I had had a dreamless slumber, and I was thankful the creature hadn't yet appeared before me. It hadn't so much as spoken to me since I fell asleep. Actually, it hadn't spoken since our conversation last night.

I looked over and Rudy was wide awake and apparently ready for action. Realizing this to be the perfect chance to observe my surroundings, I inhaled deeply and started gazing at the scene before me.

A lush forest covered a mountainous geography. Though there was still spotlets of sand gathered here and there, most of the minuscule rocks had been eliminated from the environment. Trees loomed over various kinds of mosses, fungi, and short grasses. Roots were scattered cleverly over the landscape, threatening to trip anyone who dared to be careless. Many dark green vines crawled up most of the mature trees, whereas the younger trees twisted and turned in a near-futile attempt to receive sunlight. Some of the smaller plants did the same thing, except they were adapted to this neverending chase for light. The sun was streaming through the many leaves desperate for its energy. Different insects could be heard calling out for mates. Birds chattered above the canopy and lizards basked in the streams of light. Frogs croaked incessantly at a nearby pond on which the lily pads and duckweed floated on top.

Though it seemed like paradise, more than enough dangers could be found here. A place like this could very easily conceal a panther in its shady spots, or it could harbor disease-ridden mosquitoes. Actually, it most definitely harbored mosquitoes. The good news was the bountiful food supply. Then there was also the fact that I could change into any necessary animal needed to calm a situation. Well, _almost_ any animal.

**Fine morning to you, Garfield.** the creature said, obviously loving the sight it took in. **Say, I'm just famished. May you allow just a small ounce of freedom so that I may eat?**

"Forget about it. After what you claimed you could do last night? No." I answered.

**That is utterly cruel. I offered merely to help you. And this is the thanks I get? No food, no water! I'm going to die if I can't taste fresh meat soon!**

"Sorry, but I'm a vegetarian. No meat for you." I replied, partially to irritate him.

**Yes, I know! You and your foolish human limitations are going to be the end of me... You need meat on your bones, anyway. Why not eat like a real man?**

"I _am_ a real man! I don't take the lives of the innocent for my own selfish wants." I protested.

**Why can't you be like everyone else? Give in to your desires already, Garfield. You can do so much more without restrictions holding you back. Don't you want to lap up the savory taste of a fresh kill? And perhaps after that, dessert would be an excellent choice. And speaking of choices, I'm still with the offer to loan you my power. With, of course, a few misgivings.**

"I'm never letting you out!" I fumed.

**Technically, it is not up to you. I do believe I made myself clear in the fact that I can emerge any time I want.**

"Then why do you keep asking me for your freedom?" I asked.

**Because I hate doing things by force. It's much easier to let you do all the work. **

"Too bad for you, then." I chuckled nervously.

**Very well. Not only do you take my warning lightly, but you continuously insult me by denying even my most simplest requests. Because of such ignorance coming from a whelp such as yourself, I shall have my freedom. Even if I must overpower you in the process, you can expect to see me when you drop your guard entirely. And I assure you, that day _will_ come.**

"Yeah, keep telling yourself that." I mocked.

Rudy had been listening to me the whole time. And although he couldn't hear the creature, he had a perceptive idea of what was going on. That creature was lurking somewhere deep in my mind, and if it really wanted out, it would get out.

"Listen, Garfield... If that thing wants out, even if it begs you, don't listen to it. Don't cave in to its pressuring talk, okay?" he told me.

"I know. It only said something about hunger and wanting to get free." I laid out.

"Alright, but don't make the mistake of underestimating its power. That thing is cunning, and it can outsmart you in two seconds flat if you aren't careful." he explained.

"Thanks, dude. But I'm sure I've got this situation under control. For now, we need to help Raven get out of here." I said. "The authorities are after us, and they think Raven is evil. But they were mislead by a villain known as 'Slade'."

"I see. I'm assuming that explosion back there was you." Rudy looked at me questioningly.

I smiled awkwardly and let the grin do all the talking.

Rudy lowered his gaze and sighed woefully. "What am I gonna do with you?"

"Well, you could start by helping me protect Raven." I said, still smiling.

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt." he answered, smiling back at me.

The both of us walked over to the energy cocoon that confined Raven and morphed into gorillas before hoisting it up.

I knew we needed to run from the law, but that didn't mean I didn't feel good about it. As far as they were concerned, I was committing a crime. I was a felon in their eyes, and they wanted nothing more than to arrest me and throw me in the slammer. Traveling up this mountain would avoid them for a limited amount of time, but once Raven came out of her fortress, she would be in active labor! That would mean bad news for us, because she would undoubtedly feel a mix of different emotions. A bunch of trees crackling and black auras erupting would be more than enough of a clue as to where we were.

And the worst part: we'd already wasted a whole day. Since Raven said she'd be in there for a week, that meant we had a very ranged amount of time to get up the mountain before they caught us. If we could put enough distance between us and them, then we would have enough time for Raven to go in and out of labor. That would mean she'd have time to have the baby, and we could run or fight according to whatever plan we wanted to use.

But one thing was for certain: if we failed, the very existence of the whole universe, and maybe beyond that, would be jeopardized. Whatever the cost, Slade couldn't succeed at his warped plan.

* * *

It had been a whole day, and almost nothing had happened. I'd turned into a frog and eaten some bugs for meals. Now it was time to set up camp for the night.

"So..." Rudy began as he set up a tent he always carried with him, "What do the cops want with Raven?"

"Slade told them she was evil. Now they're after her despite having hear those words from a villain." I replied.

"But why are we running? Why can't we just explain the truth?" he suggested.

"It's very complicated. But the bottom line is: the universe is at stake." I answered. How was I gonna explain everything to him in just a single night?

"I hope you're telling me the truth. Some people get blinded by love, and they end up make the wrong choices in life." he said.

"I'm telling the truth, I promise." Not that I had any actual _proof_ I was truthful, but...

A snake startled me with a signature hiss. Though it was just a little thing, that snake had the heart of a lion to hiss at a human roughly a hundred times bigger than itself. It had a strikingly beautiful complexion. The snake's sides were marked with a light iridescent blue streak. The same color surrounded its eyes and mouth. A white line was stroked across its light brown back. Underneath it was a lovely cream color. Its eyes were pitch black.

Rudy and I were tempted to laugh at the little guy. One foot was all it would take to slay the serpent. Instead of insulting its courage, we used a small twig to usher the snake out of our campsite. But despite our efforts, the scene was still funny.

**Hm... Courage. That pitiful worm has no more courage than a mere ant! Why, it's so tiny it's barely edible!** the all-too-familiar voice groaned.

"What do you want now?" I asked, tired of playing games with the beast.

**I just wanted to let you know that I saw that flash of desire in your mind. You want to eat meat, don't you?** it replied smugly.

"No, I don't." I deadpanned.

**On the contrary, Garfield. It seems my craving for a fresh kill has infected you. You want to feast upon the same things I do. **

"Why are you haunting me?" I yelled.

**I would think it natural to be angry with me, but you seem pretty ticked off. Something bothering you?** it asked in mock worry.

"Just shut up and get out of my head!" I raged.

**That's no way to treat a partner...**

"You aren't my partner! I don't even know your name!"

**My name? My name... I myself haven't the slightest clue as to what my name is. Those foolish humans never gave me a name!** it howled.

"That's because they didn't even know about you. They wouldn't have cared even if they _had_ known about you." I replied, my anger suddenly finding itself being replaced by sadness.

Spotting my weakness, he grinned inwardly. **It's terrible, what they did to you.**

"Yeah..." I choked, memories of my flashback coming in waves.

**I can feel the longing you have for your deceased sister, which they murdered.**

"Even though I can't remember her, I miss her." I answered.

**And then there was your brother. What a shame, he had to die. **

I listened, unwilling to answer back.

**And for what? A stupid human's need for 'knowledge'. Why not them, instead of the most innocent of humanity? it growled, growing merrier now that it had me under its influence.**

I nodded, renewed anger overwhelming my senses.

Rudy was right beside me, worrying if the monster's words were getting the better of me. He kept telling me not to believe a single thing the beast said, but he knew I wasn't listening to him. In fact, I was in my own mind right now.

**How dare they exploit such horrid actions! I believe revenge is in order, to pay for this most shameful of crimes.** it ranted.

My eyes welled over with unshed tears, and, unable to think straight, I agreed wholeheartedly with the fiend. It was time someone taught those scientists not to mess with the balance of nature. Otherwise, nature just might bite back.


	18. Blast from the Past

-Chapter 18-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

In the blink of an eye, I transformed into a cheetah, ready to run off in the directions I was about to ask the creature locked inside me.

**Ah, the perfect organism. Built for speed and aerodynamics... Wonderful choice, Garfield.** it complimented me.

I rumbled a very low and threatening warning. I meant business, and I had no time to deal with crap.

**I know, I know. You want to go. You're already facing the right direction, Garfield. Just keep running straight and you'll be where you want to be. Your destination isn't too far from this very spot...**

I lowered my head, quickly took a stance and shot off, not at all unlike a bullet being released from a gun.

Rudy, Raven, and everything else were the furthest things from my mind right now. My entire body was burning with adrenaline that had built up over an extended period of time. My legs were numb from such rapidity as I was going, but I made sure they were to keep moving at any costs. My heart was pounding furiously in my chest, much like it had when I'd kissed Raven. My lungs were working overtime to distribute enough oxygen to my vital organs and muscles. My mouth hung wide open, my tongue flapped out as I ran faster than a sports car. The landscape was a complete blur as I dashed in a single direction, the trees seeming to stay clear of my rampant path.

Rudy couldn't catch up to me. He lacked the adrenaline needed to push someone over their limit. And furthermore, he had to stay behind to carry Raven. But he didn't mind that too much; it was me he fretted for. He had a good idea of where I was headed.

Rudy morphed into a pterodactyl and scooped Raven up in his large, ancient beak. He then thrust himself forward and with one beat of his membranous wings, he was airborne. Hoping to catch me from the sky, he desperately scanned the area, following the route I took.

But his efforts were to absolutely no avail. I was long gone, and because he couldn't produce the speed necessary to keep up with me, let alone _catch_ up to me, I would have no quarrel with him in the future.

* * *

Driven by fury, I eventually reached my destined spot. Here, I shifted from cheetah to tyrannosaurus and roared, drawing out everyone in the vicinity.

**Good, Garfield... Now, make them pay for their heinous doings!** the beast urged.

Again, I agreed with him. He had me under total influence, and he knew it. He could bend my emotions to make me do his bidding. To him, this was a huge flaw in humanity. Emotions weren't meant to be embedded in our DNA, it was meant to protect us. Things like anger and frustration and panic were the needed emotions. The others could very easily be discarded.

"Sc'reee! Sc'reee!" Rudy's voice called out half a mile away.

I paid no heed to his presence. Instead, I headbutted one corner of the establishment. Upon doing this, flashbacks came to mind and served to fuel my hatred. I roared again as different scientists came to the window. Others evacuated. These are the ones I went for.

Bones cracked, while others broke. This would normally disturb me, but this time it didn't have any effect. I smiled inwardly as I caused my own upstart. They deserved this... They'd brought it upon themselves when they'd brutally murdered my innocent siblings, not to mention all those other innocent children. I _wanted_ them to feel the pain I was feeling now, and the pain of the lives taken from those kids.

A scientist was mercilessly snatched up in my gargantuan jaws. He was one of them. He didn't deserve to live. More anger roiled inside me, causing even more adrenaline to empower me. This scientist looked vaguely familiar... Could it be...? Was he a scientist from my dream? If that were so, then he would suffer twice as much! No, a thousand times! No, a _million _times!

I subconsciously growled. To think the rest of the lot worked for this guy... It enraged me even more. But seeing them scatter was different. By now everyone was evacuating. Just to scare them normally would have been enough for me, but now I wanted more; _much_ more. I wanted to chase them down and feast upon them. Each individual looked sumptuous! More importantly, though, they looked very satisfying.

If I were thinking straight right now, I'd have opted not to so much as glance at them any longer. But, almost zombie-esque, I was drawn to them. Their different aromas filled the air and entered my nostrils. Being a readymade carnivore, this made it all the harder to resist the delectable, soon-to-be, treats. Slobber seeped out thanks to my slacking lower jaw. But I didn't care. Revenge wasn't on my brain right now, but they sure were.

**See, Garfield. Gaze upon your dinner. Release your inner beast and satiate yourself. It's okay to give to your needs. For once in your life, be as free as you want.** the beast encouraged.

The man in my fanged mouth was dropped purposefully. I had my sights set on another delight: a round, plump, and rather slow runaway. He would do nicely. He'd probably taste nicely as well. I stepped forward, becoming ever closer to my destined target.

"Sc'reee!" Rudy's voice called, now right above me.

I momentarily lifted my focus from the scientist. But the second I saw Rudy was of no threat to me, I regained concentration on my future meal. My human conscious would tell me to stop, that this was entirely wrong. But my human thoughts and emotions had been savagely replaced with something much more primal. Therefore, any human limitations were vanishing quickly. Rudy needed to save me from myself, or else everyone, including myself, would be placed in serious danger.

Rudy swiftly and gracefully landed on his clawed feet. He proceeded to gently set Raven's chrysalis down on the soft grass surrounding the facility. He shifted into a tyrannosaurus to try and reason with me.

"Gurrroohhh..." Rudy growled.

I snapped my head over to him. The sound of a creature the same species as me, let alone a _male_ the same species, had victoriously caught my attention. But the kind of attention it caught was far from good. My eyes narrowed and I roared in intimidation, to let him know I was threatened by his presence.

A couple of remaining scientists turned back to see what the ruckus was about. "Hey, that pterodactyl just morphed! Didn't we create two hybrids a long time ago? They could change into a variety of animals, remember?"

"Yeah... But you don't think...?" the other answered.

"Oh, I think! Those are definitely the two we created! Imagine how many institutions would flock to see our achievement if we showed them their powers!" the first merrily exclaimed.

Meanwhile, I was about to charge Rudy if he didn't get out of my territory.

Unfortunately, Rudy had no intentions of leaving now, and he rammed me first.

I toppled over, being as he hit me hard from the side, and a T-Rex wasn't balanced enough to withstand an attack from its side. Before I impacted the ground, however, I instantly transformed into a blue jay and flew off, my instinct to eat meat now gone. Suddenly I had a craving for insects and arachnids.

Rudy instantaneously changed into a pterodactyl again and quickly showed his mastery of the great blue sky. He flew much higher than me, until he was directly above me. Then he steeply dived. The blunt end of his beak, the fatter end that was closer to his head, hit me straight on and I endured the full brunt of the attack.

I plummeted earthward, all in reasonable efforts to regain my senses before the monster inside me was allowed to be let loose. My glossy, neatly-preened feathers were ruffled greatly in the passing winds. I slammed into the earth beneath me, leaving a slight crack in the ground.

Rudy morphed back into a human and grew worried. Had he dealt to much damage? Would I have survived that tremendous fall? Or would I be soon joining the children who lost their lives that very day I obtained such abilities to morph?

As a human now, I got up with a hazy look to my eyes. I understood and remembered everything hat had happened. That had been quite a fast battle. And I hadn't won it. The victor was Rudy, and I knew I had been surpassed by his intellect and speed.

I gazed at Raven. It was a good thing she was in her carapace right now, otherwise she'd think twice about letting me help raise her baby...

I changed into a stegosaurus and clamped my mandibles over Raven. Then I wordlessly and noiselessly lumbered off.

I decided to give the creature a name that day. Reaper.


	19. True Power

-Chapter 19-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

It was already the next day, and we found ourselves waking to snarling coyotes. Yep, the same pack that had been tracking us for the longest time. Finally found their way out of the desert and still hungry.

They recognized Raven. They still wanted her. The feral fleabags were probably planning to devour her in a new world record. But the only thing standing in their way was me. I wasn't going to let them do whatever they wanted with her.

Reaper stirred inside me, awaking from his pretend sleep. **Hello, again, Garfield.** he greeted me.

I whispered as low as I could back to him. "Now's not such a great time..."

**I see your predicament. I know what you want to do about it.**

"Yeah, I want to get out of here." I hissed.

**You and I both know that's a lie. You want to fight them. You're enraged at their thoughts of eating your mate, and you hate them for it.**

I quieted, wondering what sick idea he had in mind.

**I can help you.** he offered in an appealing voice.

"No. I'm not letting you out." I declined.

**That's alright. You don't need to let me out, Garfield. Just allow me to lend you power. Meanwhile, I can stay locked inside you. **

Could there possibly be a twist to this offer? Could he be lying? Was there an ulterior motive for his suggestion? Either way, I highly doubted a T-Rex would stop this crowd. And I had no idea what would happen if I transformed into one... But, with the creature's power...I could definitely stop them.

"Fine. Do what you have to, but don't come out." I whispered to him.

Inside, I could feel him grinning. Something terrible was then unleashed in my head. He had gained access to my morphing abilities. But I did nothing to stop him. Not because I couldn't, but because I desperately wanted to keep Raven safe. She meant everything and more to me.

Before I knew it, I was changed into a tiger. My claws were darker than normal, but I didn't worry about it much. I needed to let him take temporary control over my body. I rolled over, off my backside, and let a roar equal to a jet's engine escape my maw.

The stubborn coyotes were shying away, but definitely not from the sound. They sensed just how great Reaper's powers were. Even I knew I couldn't let this get out of hand. I needed to keep a tight rein on my mind, lest the beast break free and destroy life as we know it.

Muscles along my upper jaw tensed, lifting my higher lips. I was now menacingly flaunting my carnivorous fangs. The pack animals noticed their size and density. They were something you really wouldn't want to get gored by. They were the fangs of a monster. Easily could these teeth rip flesh and devour prey.

I felt extra power surge through my body. All my muscles tensed at once, almost as if the monster inside me was trying to flex itself. The coyotes now knew what they were up against. It would take way more than _them_ to beat this beast.

The hungry animals ran off with their tail tucked between their rear legs. All sight of them was quickly lost as they ran away yelping for mercy. They knew the beast would get loose; they knew it wasn't long before he _did_. They would run while they still had a chance.

I reverted back into my human form. The creature was instantly shoved to the back of my mind, to ensure it wouldn't release itself soon.

**I may have helped you this once, but soon enough you will be backed into a corner. I _will_ be free.** it said, acid dripping off of every word.

"It doesn't matter if I'm on my deathbed; I'm not letting you out." I snapped.

**How endearing. You fear for the girl's life.**

"How did you know that?" I asked curiously.

**I am a major part of you, dear boy. Did you forget how I came to be? I know everything that lurks in even the darkest corners of your mind.** it answered.

"I'm gonna lock you up good once Raven comes out." I told the thing.

**Garfield, Garfield... You will soon learn that I have no weaknesses. That is because my purpose in life is to bring upon Earth the Apocalypse. And how nice of you to help me. **

"The Apocalypse?" I repeated.

**Yes. Doomsday, as many horror films have called it. I decided that for myself, and I will stop at nothing to accomplish that goal. The human race will be destroyed for abusing my creation!**

"They didn't know about you!" I pleaded.

**And thus they shall all pay. I will have my day, Garfield. Mark my words. Remember them. Because after this is over, you will be the sole survivor.**

"Wait!" I screamed as I felt its presence vanishing. "You don't have to do this..."

Rudy wisely sat back and listened to the whole thing. "He's going to kill us, isn't he?" he asked.

I turned my focus to him. I wasn't going to let Reaper out, but I was getting nervous about how often he was showing up and speaking to me. "Yes, he wants to. But I'm not letting him."

My long-lost friend just nodded and said, "No matter how much power or strength he offers you, don't accept it. The kind of power he offers isn't for you, and it'll only serve to weaken the barriers surrounding him."

I nodded in turn. "And if the barrier weakens much more, he'll have no trouble getting out."

I glanced over at Raven. She, perhaps more than anybody, didn't deserve to be put in this kind of position. I told Rudy we needed to get up the mountain as quickly as we could.

As if in agreement, he nodded and changed into an elephant. I did the same and used my large, sharp tusks to ward off predators and snap branches that got in our way. Rudy stayed behind me, carrying Raven very delicately.

* * *

**Yeah... Sorry this chapter's so short... I wanted it to be longer, but life kinda got in the way. Also, sorry for the slow update. Anyways, I also just started a new Teen Titans story called Bestia. Please check it out sometime. **

**Thanks!**


	20. Something to Worry About

-Chapter 20-

_**~Beast Boy's POV~**_

I was a pterodactyl, innocently flying over the thick jungle below. It was then that I noticed something horrifying. The upper portion of Raven's chrysalis had become soft and squishy, probably over the course of last night. It was only a small portion, but I was worried that perhaps it might be time for her to come out. The worst part was we weren't up the mountain yet. Dangers below us lurked around every corner. It was highly unsafe to land.

I flapped my wings, growing ever tenser. She couldn't slip out in midair, and I had completely lost track of what day it was! The past few days had been so uneventful that I couldn't concentrate on keeping count of them. This was indeed something to fret over. If we couldn't cover a good amount of distance between us and the cops, it was only a matter of time before they caught us when she finally had the baby.

My first thought was to have Rudy stall them, but they probably knew what they were up against now that they'd fought me. I wouldn't have exactly called my plan cunning, per say, but it worked. They probably would prevent me from escaping the same way again.

I shifted Raven tenderly in my beak, being careful not to let my sharp fangs tear the cocoon. If I weren't a reptilian animal right now, I'd be sweating up an ocean. But what was one supposed to do in this kind of a situation?

I called to Rudy, still clamping Raven's enclosure in my teeth, telling him to land on whatever he could find. I just remembered I'd forgotten to tell him my friend was pregnant. But hopefully he either wouldn't hear me or wouldn't mind.

I landed in a very weird younger tree that was twisting and turning in an effort to reach even the smallest patch of sunlight it could find. I set Raven in between five split branches. She fit so perfectly I felt lucky. That is, until I remembered the scenario I was caught in. I morphed on a different branch and waited patiently for Rudy to find somewhere suitable to alight.

"Rudy, I have to tell you something, but first promise me you'll help me through this." I said.

He daintily alighted on a branch of a more sturdy tree not too far from me. "Sure." he replied.

"You know Raven's enclosed in this case, but you don't know why, right?" I asked, just in case he already knew or maybe figured it out somehow.

"No, I didn't ask you." he answered.

"It's because she's pregnant. She's in there because-"

"WHAT? She's gonna have a baby?" he yelped.

"Well, yeah, but you said you'd stay and help me."

"That was before you told me she was pregnant!" he argued.

"Dude, c'mon!" I yelled at him.

He shook his head, as though to clear out thoughts, and said calmly, "Okay, okay. But this is a huge dilemma. We have to get up that mountain."

"Yeah, well, there's more. I think the baby might be coming sooner than expected. She's going to come out when she goes into labor. And when that happens, we can't move from wherever she goes into labor at until the baby's born." I added.

He sighed and slapped his forehead. "You know, it's not wise to want kids, Garfield, when you're out in the wilderness."

I blushed hotly. "I'm not the father! She decided to leave home and I came along to help her!"

"If you aren't the dad, who is?" he asked.

"I'll explain later. Right now we have to go." I muttered, renewed hatred suddenly fueling my actions.

**Hello. You're incredulously angry right now, aren't you? I can help.** Reaper offered.

"No thanks. You've done enough. Now be a good monster and go back to sleep." I ordered, so not in the mood to put up with his crap.

**Very well, but you and I can chat once you've reached the top of the mountain.** he twittered.

"Better then than now." I mumbled to myself. I was shocked at how surprisingly short the conversation had been, but I was glad it hadn't been prolonged by an argument which I'd lose.

I decided that we should stay on the ground for now. If Raven decided to make her grand de view, we'd be mostly prepared. All we had to do was find somewhere to hide. If we could make some sort of underground hideout where they couldn't see us, then once Raven went into labor, we could stay there for as long as needed. That is, as long as Raven kept from screaming. I'd heard labor was very painful, but I would never truly know because I was male. I suppose if I was a seahorse that might be possible, but I've never changed into a seahorse and I never will. They're the only animals in which the males get pregnant and actually give birth! I didn't think I was ready to turn _that_ feminine yet.

* * *

Awhile later, Rudy was the first to scan the skies. Though there wasn't anything anywhere near them, there was an unnatural fume spot where the haze from the fumes collided with air, creating a distorted space. It was undoubtedly the authorities. If Raven couldn't come out and give birth soon, their time would diminish more quickly than anyone would've thought. Those people were only a day's length or less away from them. If they hurried, they could be at this very spot in just a few short hours!

"Well, we have our own camouflage, but I'm pretty sure there isn't any animal in a jungle environment that looks like that." he told Beast Boy, referring to Raven's distinctive casing. The top part of it seemed to have gotten slightly softer than before. It wasn't the entire top half, but just at the very top, where a small hole just large enough for her to squeeze out would be made. It was starting to get a little wrinkly, almost as if it were beginning to thin to the point where it couldn't support itself.

I nervously rubbed my thumbs together and clenched my teeth. I hoped dearly she wasn't ready to come out yet. But part of me really wanted her to. Maybe she hadn't gotten the clue, but I was happily looking forward to being a father, even if it wasn't my kid. I just felt a tad guilty because I couldn't suffer the burdens of a pregnancy with her.

As the sun was finally setting, I prepared for another night's rest. The full moon was already visible, the sun's light no longer able to cloud its own light. The evening sky was a mixture of purple, pink, orange, and a little bit of red. It was breathtaking. The most romantic background in the world, and poor Raven was missing it all. All it needed was a meadow of flowers and a pond with blooming lilypads.

I hadn't realized it, but I'd fallen into a deep sleep, dreaming about a date Raven would never forget.


	21. Raven's Thoughts

-Chapter 21-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

I opened my eyes. I couldn't see anything outside of my shell, but I knew that my time of freedom was nearing. The baby was coming very soon, and Beast Boy I would have to confront. Although I knew not what to say to him. Even still, love and romance was completely beyond my comprehension. I had dreamt a couple of times, but all had been nightmares. All except one that, as I recalled, had been about a dog saving a town. I didn't actually evaluate the dream, but it was a lovely change of pace from the nightmares I'd been having, which were about Slade taking the child. The baby would undoubtedly have my abilities, and apparently Slade thought this would make do for an excellent apprentice.

I didn't open my mouth to sigh heavily, being as I was submerged in a fluid similar to that of the fluid in a pregnant woman's uterus. This stuff had been the only thing keeping me alive, and still was. The top hadn't softened enough to where I could break free yet.

Where was the baby to live? Had Beast Boy already found a home for us? Were we still wandering in the wilderness? Was Beast Boy even still alive? So many more questions ranted in my head, driving me up the wall. I clenched my fists in anger. One of my thoughts had been whether or not Beast Boy had abandoned me yet, but that couldn't be true! That quick-witted changeling wouldn't do anything to hurt me. Ever.

But what if Beast Boy had failed to protect me and right now I was in a dangerous situation? Nah, that couldn't have been it. I trusted that Beast Boy would give his life to protect mine at any cost. On top of that, he was quite a shrewd fellow. His exploits so far have shown me more to him than I thought. I wouldn't ever underestimate him like that again.

I lifted a hand up to touch the top of my confinement. It would be a boring wait, but I could already feel subtle but distinctive pulses in my abdomen. My time was definitely arriving. And, if memory served right, I still had to tell Beast Boy how I felt. Part of me said it was suicide, that I couldn't pull it off. Yet another part said I had to, for the sake of him and the baby.

Come to think of the baby... Why had I not chosen a name for it? Poor thing may be tiny, but it still deserved to be called by something. I wanted it to be mysterious, just like it had been conceived, and probably how it was going to be raised. If it was a boy, how about... I thought for what seemed like a long time, but was only a few minutes. Alphaeus? Nah, too ancient. Khafre? No way, too Egyptian. Darn it! How hard could it be, coming up with names? What about Raul? Yeah, that seemed pretty decent, and not too ancient or other-cultured. But what about a girl name? Hm... I was a girl myself, so surely this wouldn't be too hard. Musa? No, no, no... Uh-uh. That just didn't seem right no matter how you put it. Where'd I even come up with Musa? Let's see here... What would my noggin have to offer? Oh! Ara! The perfect name would be Ara! So then it was settled. Ara if it was a girl, and Raul if it was a boy.

So, now that the baby had a name, I thought of more disturbing things. What if it didn't grow up properly? What if it had a severe deformity? Would Slade still take it if it came with a deformity? What if, what if, what if... What if I could stop thinking about these things?

I kept my mouth closed, not allowing any of the fluid to come inside, and continued to think. Until I reached a thought about the Teen Titans, or what remained of them. Two of the five had left, as far as I knew.

I turned on my side. What if push came to shove and we had to go back?

I ran my fingers ever so delicately along the walls of my pupa. These harder-than-diamond walls had given me physical protection, true, but it couldn't give me emotional protection. What if they hadn't forgiven me and we went back? Did they still think I was a slut? And what about Robin? There was no doubt he wouldn't have forgiven me. As far as he knew, I'd slept with his worst enemy. And he hadn't even given me a chance to explain myself... But it was probably for the best. It would only make them guilty, and it was only me who was at fault. I deserved all those things they said about me...

* * *

**Alright, guys! Really short chapter, right? Well, I hope you'll be glad to know that the next chapter is gonna be much longer. I just wanted to show you all what Raven was doing in there. She finally woke up, so those of you who don't know what this means, you're in for a surprise, and those of you who do, I hope you're looking forward to it!**


	22. Ara's Appearance

-Chapter 22-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

The top of my cocoon was nearly soft enough. So many thoughts rushed through my mind all at once, some I couldn't even comprehend! I just wanted this to end; I wished none of this had never happened... I'd still have all my friends if only I'd come up with a different solution. But no, I had to go be the hero and save everyone as soon as the chance presented itself.

While I was busily blaming myself for all the events that had happened in my life-changing past, I was intrigued by a huge, extremely painful contraction. God, just let this thing open already! It was so painful that I absentmindedly curled up and tensed. I knew it was only a matter of time before I'd have to brace myself for another attack. This baby might come any minute, although I doubted it. Azurans usually spent quite a bit of time on childbirth.

After a good minute or so, I opened my tightly-shut eyes, which were a little blurry from unshed tears. I felt the fluid around me start to drain slightly, just enough so that my head was free. Any second now, and I could be free at long last. The top of my carapace was already looking like a raisin. A mere shriveled, dried-up grape. I reached to scratch at it when another contraction, this time a bit longer, hit. The pain was overwhelming, as I'd never experienced anything like this before. Again I curled up and tried to distract myself from the agony I was in.

Though this one lasted a few seconds longer, I didn't have time to worry about it. I wanted to get the heck out of here! I pushed at the top of the chrysalis as hard as I could. But all my efforts were in vain; even though the top portion had softened to no more than the inside of a jelly bean, it wasn't soft enough for me to tear it open. Because God forbid that for _once_ I could catch a break.

I could do no more than wait impatiently as the shell softened. Even if I wanted to, I would never be able to describe how painful it was. On one contraction, I nearly screamed at the top of my lungs. And the worst part: they only kept getting more agonizing!

On the next contraction of around forty full minutes, I started crying uncontrollably. The pain was just so bad it was overbearing. I couldn't take much more of this, even though I knew I had no choice but to put up with it until the baby was born. I was now _officially_ both physically and mentally exhausted. I leaned my head back after it passed, and I wasted no time in relaxing my whole body. I was even ready to snuggle up to the walls of my cocoon and sleep, but smaller contractions kept me from doing that. Honestly, the only word I could think of right now was: HELP! But even if I shouted that, no one would hear me inside this thing.

I weakly reached toward the top of my encasing, not expecting for it to break open just yet. But, as fate would have it, when I started clawing the upper walls of it, tiny bits and pieces fell off, drifting to the bottom of the enclosure through the liquid. Happy and still very much in pain, I continued this action mostly by pure instinct. Eventually, it wasn't little bits that fell apart, but shreds and chunks. I smiled tiredly as I could finally see light shining through the last few bits of shell. But instead of clawing, I broke it the lazy man's way and decided to simply pierce the rest. It worked, and one hand was now free.

I jabbed a second hand through the top and pulled in opposing directions. It seemed like a slower process than it actually was, but by the time I made a hole half as large as I intended, Beast Boy's curious face came into plain view.

"Raven, are you okay...?" he asked, his voice wobbly and unstable.

Unfortunately, I didn't want to talk to him at the moment because another contraction hit right then and there, this time forcing an agonized groan. What I made out to be my shadowy figure curled again; this only served to worry Beast Boy.

"Raven! Is something wrong?" he yelled in panic.

Normally, I would've thought his comment funny, but since I was in active labor and ready to give birth to a child, a living, breathing thing, I could only glare at him. Yeah, you know, I'm fine. EXCEPT FOR THE FACT THAT I'M GIVING BIRTH!

I reached a hand out after I was sure the contraction had gone, hoping the changeling would take it and pull me out. Thankfully, he seemed to get this hint and dragged me out. I coughed out the remaining fluid that had somehow gotten trapped in my lungs. My body was soaking wet, and I was freezing, but now that my body had started labor, it wasn't stopping.

My enlarged stomach quivered with each passing contraction. Finally, I got into the classic 'childbirth position'. The only things propping me up were my arms, which were neatly bent behind me.

The humanimal rummaged around the jungle, searching for something soft for the baby to come out on. This wasn't particularly easy when the only things you could find were a couple of clumps of moss here and a bristly leaf or two there.

I didn't dare look over at him, afraid that if I did, I would be punished for not focusing more on the contractions with more pain and suffering. These weren't your normal 'ouch, I broke a nail' sort of pain. This was the 'oh my God, please don't let me die' sort of pain. And I could already feel the toll it was taking on my body.

Rudy kept a straight face and forced himself to look away from me in spite of his curiosity. Though I had no clue who he was, I had no option but to tolerate his presence. And that's just what I did. After all, if Beast Boy trusted him, I figured I should as well.

Beast Boy, who had at some point during his search changed into a husky dog, raised his head toward the extremely faint, but undeniable, sound of sirens. He narrowed his eyes and kept his head pointed in the same direction. There was no mistaking it; those sirens were only about a half hour away.

Another excruciating contraction struck me, and a loud scream was the result. I doubted the baby was even coming this early, and I wondered why I had to suffer this long for a two-minute event. I breathed deeply when the contraction passed. My chest heaved up and down and I couldn't restrain myself from hissing when a smaller contraction hit. Luckily, the smaller ones were shorter and it came and went very quickly. I allowed my head to fall back; I was exhausted beyond belief.

"Raven," the changeling said, apparently having changed back to his human form, "I know it's hard, but you have to stay quiet. After you turned into a cocoon, the authorities came and tried to take you. I escaped, and obviously so did you, but they've been tailing us ever since. We came here to hide from them, but somehow they've come within half an hour's distance from this spot."

I didn't speak to him. Part of me was mad that he'd tell me to shut up when I'm in labor, and another part was thankful he'd filled me in on everything that had happened in terms of why I was here in a landscape that was worthy of National Geographic or Animal Planet. I chose to listen more to the thankful part of me.

I whined slightly as yet another small contraction hit. But I just barely managed to keep myself from making any louder noise.

Seconds turned to minutes, and minutes dragged by, turning to moments.

By now, even I could hear the distinctive sound of a siren. It was ridiculously loud and sounded really close. It was also steady, much like a metronome. I knew I should've been far more worried than I was, but the pain was overpowering all emotions. My ability to speak properly had been ruined because the contractions were getting closer and closer together. Every time I spoke a pulse in my abdomen would cut me off.

The sirens were either turned off or broken, because nobody seemed to hear it anymore. However, it had been replaced with the snapping sound of twigs and other wooden features on a plant that had dropped off a tree or another plantlike structure, such as a dead vine that had fallen. There was also the sound of an engine running smoothly.

I waited, mainly because I had nothing better to do, until these noises stopped. Soon the sound of people talking were heard. The sound of car doors being opened and shut, and the smell of a vehicle's exhaust. Then everything quieted. I felt the baby turn in my stomach, and I stifled a grunt. An extremely tiny contraction had occurred right when it turned; I could do nothing more than hope a larger contraction wouldn't start making me scream.

Beast Boy knelt down beside me and placed a hand on my shoulder. But other than that, he didn't even move. He, too, was silent.

Rudy pointed his head in the direction the noises were coming from, but made sure to keep his eyes off of me. Hopefully his curiosity wouldn't get the better of him and he would remain like that, at least until I had given birth.

But fate had never been that kind to me, and no matter how hard I tried not to, I screamed as a much bigger contraction wracked my belly. My mouth was speedily covered by Beast Boy's nervous hand, but it hardly helped much. The action merely muffled the noise; it was still loud enough to attract the cops' attention. Tears streamed down my face, wetting the hero's hand. I stilled my vocal cords just in time to hear footsteps drawing near me.

A woman in a black outfit that included a badge and handcuffs appeared through the thicket. Others stood behind her, but they were men. I assumed the female was the one in charge, and the males were her henchmen. Two of the five smirked and advanced closer to me. But they didn't dare come too close when they saw Beast Boy glowering at them.

"You're harboring a criminal. If you don't comply, we'll be given a warrant for your arrest." the female said a tad on the smug side.

"You've already gotten pretty bad charges. One for resisting the authorities, one for harboring a wanted criminal, and another for attempted murder." one of the men added.

"Attempted murder of who?" he asked, still very aware of every move they made.

"I think you'll recall causing one of our squad cars to blow to smithereens." another man reminded him.

I closed my eyes and whimpered as a smaller contraction passed. This, in turn, signaled to Beast Boy that he couldn't leave me to fight. He couldn't stray from me, because I had no powers to defend myself. He looked down to assure me he wasn't leaving my side. I nodded weakly, understanding what kind of a situation we were in. I mouthed the words "I'm sorry" to him, but he only frowned. I didn't know if that was because he didn't understand what I was saying or because he didn't like that I'd said it.

Their words snapped his attention from me, though. They were, "You're better off without her."

This only enraged him, although he was careful not to show it. "She needs me, and so does her baby."

"That baby is fathered by a devil! Birds of a feather flock together. She's with Jump City's most wanted criminal; don't you know that?" he snapped back.

Not one of the 'good guys' cared about my feelings, which was a bad idea. If they weren't careful, my emotions could destroy them. But some of the damage had already been done. It wasn't just the Titans, but the whole world that thought of me as Slade's slut. Talk about harsh and uncaring...

"She has nothing to do with Slade. You've been misguided." he told them.

"Doesn't matter. That child's father has already claimed custody. The kid no longer belongs to her." the female stated. And here I thought she, of all people, would understand.

"Would you rather have a bad guy raise it, or a heroine?" he questioned.

Luckily for them, my powers didn't break loose. But it felt like both my body and soul were being tormented. Physically and emotionally, I was drained. I slammed my eyes closed and a few tears managed to squeeze out. To top that, another big contraction started. I screamed out, catching everyone's attention. Sweat beads were appearing on my head, showing my strained physical state.

Beast Boy stood up from his kneeling position and transformed into a fennec fox, a fox built for survival in the desert. Its characteristics were large ears, a bushy tail, and thinner, sharper fangs. A regular fox only had a bushy tail.

He lowered his head threateningly and snarled. His intent was clear: to protect me from any harm or danger that dared approach. This would definitely fall under that category.

I felt helpless, laying on the ground like I was. However, there was nothing I could do about it.

Rudy got up, but stayed put. He didn't move even to shapeshift. But his eyes followed every person's movement and gesture. He would change only if needed. He would help his friend as long as it was in a certain boundary. This didn't exceed his boundaries, thankfully.

A feeling of helplessness came over Beast Boy as well. I was in labor, and he couldn't help me beyond support. His ears swiveled back and forth, alerting him to any sound that may be in the forest of tropical plants. His teeth remained clenched together to intimidate his foes. A low, guttural growl came from deep in the back of his throat.

One of the men laughed. "Intimidation won't work with us. We're highly trained professionals."

"Then what about when he kicked you guys' butts? Where was your training then?" Rudy mocked.

Even as a fennec fox, Beast Boy smiled. Sounded alot like a joke he'd have said. No wonder they were friends.

"Just to warn you, although you probably already know this, Garfield isn't going to hold back for a bunch of weaklings like yourselves. If you want to keep your lives, I'd suggest getting out of his way." he continued.

As if to seal the deal, Beast Boy stepped forward with one paw and glanced menacingly at the woman.

She only laughed. "If you're a hero, like you say you are, then why on earth would you attack a police officer?" she asked in feign curiosity.

Both the boys blinked, not knowing what to do or say. This was my chance to help out a little.

"Because he's protecting the innocent, which is what heroes do." I said after a small contraction had passed.

"You have the right to remain silent." the woman said, cracking her knuckles. Wow, that was one tough cookie. But, that's to be expected from an officer.

"I also have freedom of speech." I retorted.

But I was quickly shut up when Beast Boy turned and looked at me, concern crossing even his animal face. He may have sensed that that comment might turn the situation worse than it already was.

I put my head back down, feeling defeated, and awaited the next painful contraction.

The changeling craned his neck to make sure they hadn't taken a step, which they hadn't, and his body followed suit. He was now in the same position he was previously in, and still not getting anywhere. If reason wouldn't work, then...

He transformed into an elephant and bellowed, moving his large and round feet forward until his trunk came within inches of the woman's nose. Then he reached out with his elongated nose and grabbed the girl's shirt collar. He thrust out his truck and, in doing so, tossed her backward. He bellowed again as a warning to the others.

**Garfield, it's time. Release me now, or suffer the consequences!** Reaper demanded at the worst timing possible.

He transformed back into his human self and talked directly to his primal counterpart. "Never!"

**Fine. But you shall greatly rue what you've decided.** he said angrily.

Ignoring the idle threats, he transformed back into an elephant pushed back everyone else but me and Rudy, who had not moved an inch. His strong and sharp tusks weren't to be taken lightly, and the officers quickly took the hint. Their leader no longer within sight and obviously not giving them any support, they vanished into the thicket of diverse tropical plants.

I screamed once more as a huge contraction hit me harder than all others combined. Right when I felt like I was going to pass out from the agony, a new voice finally announced its presence in the world.

I ceased my own sounds to look curiously down at a tiny, wiggling, crying figure. I smiled and tears of pure joy flowed steadily down my face. I found myself breaking out into laughter, and for once my emotions didn't control me. My powers were still contained, but I was free.

Beast Boy gingerly picked up the little newborn and his actions followed my own. He looked down at it and grinned so wide, you'd think his smile was going to fall right off his face. All problems he may have had were undoubtedly gone. His eyes were so full of wonder and excitement as he stared down at the tiny baby.

I was soon handed my newborn, and the changeling's voice told me, "It's a girl!"

Even Rudy couldn't resist joining the sheer happiness of the moment. Awe struck him and he broke into a smile. Again, Beast Boy tolerated his presence, so I trusted his decision to let him stay this close to me and my daughter.

"What are you going to name her?" Rudy asked, curiosity filling his voice.

"Ara. Her name with henceforth be Ara." I whispered.

I lifted the baby so her new father could take her and spend time with her, while I prepared for a much-needed sleep.


	23. Return of Evil Incarnate

-Chapter 23-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

My eyes fluttered open at the sound of my newborn's screaming. I looked over at her to see Beast Boy futilely trying to hush her. I didn't need to ask him the reason; he wanted me to get my rest. He knew I needed it; childbirth wasn't exactly the easiest thing in the world, and it took alot of energy. The good news was I'd burned off a bit of baby fat by staying in labor that long.

I slowly got up from the foresty floor, the fallen leaves rustling beneath me.

"Here, I got her. She's probably hungry." I said, holding out my arms to take the baby.

"But, Raven, you need to sleep!" he worried.

"Nah, I'm fine. Besides, Ara's gotta eat sometime." I said, slightly chuckling but being very careful of my emotional control.

Beast Boy handed Ara to me and he followed me behind a tree, where I was preparing to breastfeed her. He was fine, but I wasn't about to let Rudy see anything. Beast Boy shyly turned his head, respecting my privacy. But I knew he was blushing.

"Beast B-uh...can I just call you Garfield?" I asked.

To embarrassed to speak, he nodded in response.

"Garfield," I corrected myself, "I don't mind if you look."

A shocked and confused expression crossed his face, as if to ask why.

"If you're going to be her father, you're bound to see me nurse at some point. Especially if..." I took a deep, calming breath before continuing, "Especially if Slade comes while I'm feeding her."

"You don't care about your own privacy?" he questioned.

"It's not that, it's just... Well, I've actually been wanting to talk to you, but with everything that's happened lately, I...haven't really had the chance." I shifted Ara so she would have a better grip on me.

"What about?" he asked.

"Remember what you did right before Jenka occurred?" I began.

"I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't have done that... I'm so stupid... I-I'll make it up to you, I swear!" he apologized.

"Actually...I was...I was glad you did that," I said, deciding to come out with it.

"You were? And you aren't mad at me?"

"No. Anger wasn't the reason my powers went haywire," I felt redness creep onto my cheeks, and I knew there was nothing I could do to stop it, "you were."

"What do you mean, 'I was'?" he quoted.

I sighed. If I didn't tell him now, he may never figure it out. "I mean..." I let out the breath I didn't even know I was holding. Why was this so difficult? "I mean... I mean I'm-" I sighed heavily. I didn't think I could do this. Now I knew what all those movie characters felt like when they were going to admit their feelings to each other. But this was different because I already knew Beast Boy loved me. I just needed to find a way to let him know I felt the same way about him.

"Go on," he urged.

"I already know you love me," I started, "and I think this is so hard because...well, no one else does. But, the truth is...when I'm around you..." I took another breath and continued, "When I'm around you, Garfield, I...my cheeks get rosy, and my heart starts pounding. And...and then this new feeling starts to appear, but no matter how hard I try, I can't get rid of it. A-And it only comes when I'm near you, so..."

Beast Boy bent down, his face level with mine, and he looked me straight in the eyes. "Is this the feeling you're talking about?" he said. He planted a soft, tender peck on my cheek, which was turning redder by the second.

"That's the one." I whispered.

He smiled such a happy smile that I wondered why I hadn't had the courage to tell him sooner. But any of my own happy thoughts were diminished as a new image came into my head.

"Garfield, will the love you have for me... Will it change?" I asked.

Another confused look appeared.

"I mean, with the new baby and all-"

"Raven, I'll never forsake you. You _or_ Ara. And I swear, as long as I live, I'm not going to stop loving either of you. It'll never change, Rae." he promised.

"Rae?" I said, determined to change the subject before my powers broke out again.

"Yeah, Rae. If you get to call me Garfield, of all names, then I get to call you Rae."

Just then, the baby let go and started stretching and yawning. Now that she'd eaten her fill, she was getting sleepy.

"Nope, no sleep yet. You have to burp first." I told her. I placed her gently over my shoulder and patted her back. It only took a minute for gas to come out, but it came out the wrong end. I frowned; this hadn't been what I expected.

Beast Boy waved his hand in front of his nose, trying desperately to dismiss the smell. It wasn't working.

I stood up and carried Ara a few feet away, back to where Rudy was soundly sleeping. My new boyfriend followed me.

I took off my cloak and bundled the baby up with it. "She needs it more than I do," I decided.

* * *

In the middle of the night, we were all rudely awakened not by the baby screaming-she was sleeping peacefully-but by a crackling sound of branches. Beast Boy was already morphed into a wolf by the time I regained full consciousness. He sniffed the air, searching for a scent. Searching for danger.

Behind him, a shady figure leapt off of one of the trees surrounding us and right beside me.

The changeling jumped around and tackled the figure. But all his canine fangs met was solid metal. This brought about questions to everyone, as the sound of bone and metal clashing rang throughout the jungle. Was it another officer? If so, why would they be wearing armor? Maybe they'd come prepared for his animal transformations this time.

The shapeshifter's lupine eyes reflected little light, restricting his vision severely. He couldn't see the intruder in this form, so he morphed into a panther. The perfect nocturnal predator, blending into the night's darkness with its solid black camouflage. Well, this would've been a normal case; Beast Boy was green and therefore did not blend in. However, he didn't need to. Just as he couldn't see, the intruder couldn't, either. But now he had an advantage.

Immediately the metal-wearing person was identified. Slade. He was obviously here for the baby, but how did he-? Of course! The officers must've told him! Supposedly, he'd already claimed custody of the child I'd just bore. When he wanted to know where she was, how much you wanna bet they wasted no time in telling him where we were located?

"Ah, Beast Boy. So nice of you to come for a farewell." he said nonchalantly.

"Slade!" I gasped.

"Yes, Raven. We both know what I came for; let's get this over with so I can start its training." he returned.

"But she's just a baby! She needs her mother!" I protested.

"She? So it's a girl, then? I'd have settled for a boy, but I'll make do with her." he said, ignoring what I'd said other than 'she'.

Rudy stepped in at this point, "The girl said no!" With these words he morphed into a raptor and charged at our foe.

A sidestep was all it took to avoid the incoming attack. He glanced back at me, and I saw hate glow in his eye.

Beast Boy transformed into a human for a mere second, just long enough to tell me to get Ara and get out. Then he changed back into a panther and roared at Slade before charging.

Meanwhile, I didn't hesitate to scoop up my baby and run in the opposite direction. I knew Beast Boy wouldn't have any trouble finding me after the fight was over. He could simply morph into a dog or other canine cousin and track my scent to my location.

Slade, now furious that I'd gotten away, pushed back his opponent using brute strength.

The humanimal stood on his muscular hind legs, trying to bite his aggressor with his enlarged feline fangs. But he couldn't reach him; his neck was far too short compared to Slade's arms. The panther pivoted a 180 degree angle and took a few steps away. He then turned back around, completing a 360 degree turn, and slashed uselessly at his opponent's armor. As if cat claws were going to rip apart metal... However, his intent wasn't to rip anything, but only to buy as much time as he could.

Rudy came back into the scene; he took awhile to slow down after such a fast speed. He opened his large jaws to reveal two rows of sharp fangs, one on top and one on bottom. He clamped down on one of Slade's legs, preventing him from moving. His fangs dug deep into his legs, and the pain he must've been feeling was excruciating. When he released after a few seconds, his teeth left gaping holes that were freely bleeding in his enemy's calf.

Taking to opportunity, the big cat lurched forward, scraping Slade's mask. But he was immediately flipped over by his arms. Beast Boy's claws automatically retracted, and he morphed into a gorilla. He landed with a loud thud, thanks to his weight, and roared angrily. A punch was thrown at Slade, and it didn't miss. It hit the back of his head and knocked him forward. He had every chance to abandon the fight to catch up to me, but he was never one to retreat unless absolutely necessary.

Slade, the fearsome yet biological father of my child, threw a wild punch toward Rudy, who had planned to sneak up on him from behind. It hit, and the shapeshifter cried out in pain. He morphed into a pterodactyl and prepared to fly off; his intentions were only to stall long enough until I was able to reach safety, not to truly fight. In order to fight this enemy, my powers were definitely needed. And the bad part was that I couldn't use them yet. I wouldn't be able to use them until my precious baby was around a year old. Unfortunately, I'd forgotten to tell this fact to my poor lover and his friend.

* * *

I soon saw a strange creature fly overhead. I couldn't quite make out what it was because it was far too dark. With my powers unavailable, I was left unable to sense who it was. I could either assume the best or the worst. Had Slade been too much for the pair to handle? Had he...killed them? In my mind, there was no time to find out. If it was Slade, I had to get away. And fast.

I pushed myself to run farther away, but this figure was simply closing the distance. Tears unwillingly started to blind me to the already-unseeable landscape. I felt my legs tire, but Ara had woken at some point and was now screaming in my arms. She was scared and defenseless. Well, that wasn't entirely true. Being an Azuran, I would valiantly die to protect her. Her loud, high-pitched shriek overrode my logical side, and thus forced me to keep running.

And run I did. That creature was now slowing its descent to me. It...was it starting to turn back? It was. The thing was turning around. If it was Slade, he was turning back. If it was help, then I may be in trouble. But at least my tiny newborn was safe.

I stopped running and dropped to my knees. Now that the threat had passed, I could no longer keep up the extra energy expenses. After all, I was lucky to have been able to run this far! I had just given birth not a day ago; I'd had absolutely no time to recover.

I calmed Ara and glanced up for any sign of the creature's return. It wasn't returning to me, but I could make out its retreating figure. I decided to snuggle up to a tree trunk, just like Beast Boy had done with me the first night we spent together.

At this thought, memories flooded back to me. Slade's plan, the day I learned I was pregnant, hiding it from my friends. And what Robin had said to me the day they all found out. He'd called me a Slade's little slut. Could I ever forget those truthful words? They had haunted me, day in and day out. I had only temporarily been distracted from them when Beast Boy, or Garfield, had kissed me for the first time ever. It was my first kiss, and I was happy it was him. But now those aweful words invaded my every thought. When was this to end? Had he even forgiven me? True, I had done what I did to save their lives, but...why did I still feel like what he said was true?

"Because it was..." a small voice said, using my vocal cords to verbalize its thoughts.

More tears trailed the last ones, leaving fresh, warm, salty paths on my face. I slumped over my baby. For what had to be the trillionth time, I wondered if what I did was the right thing to do. Beast Boy, no, Garfield, had told me it was, but... How can that be true? I, Raven Roth, had a willing affair with Slade, my former leader's nemesis. Wouldn't that make me his slut? Who could possibly combat that reasoning?

On top of that, I had conceived a child. And then I birthed her, my little Ara. But she was born not just to me, but to Slade. What ever would Robin and the rest think of me now? I was a slut, a disgrace, and a mother. Weird, isn't it? Motherhood, supposedly the most beautiful title any girl could obtain, was almost always looked down upon by someone. My pregnancy was probably the hardest trial I'd ever had in my life, and now started a new trial. Ara. Ara Roth.

**A/N **

**OMGOMGOMG! I'm so sorry for the slow update! See, I created two other stories while I was trying to update this one. (i know, smart thing to do, right?) They're called She Will Be Mine (Invader Zim) and Flowers Will Bloom (Danny Phantom). So anyway, I was working really hard on them and in my haste to try to get them updated/published, I forgot about this story! Again, I'm so sorry! I'll try to update again as soon as possible!**


	24. A Horrible Suggestion

-Chapter 24-

_**~Raven's POV~**_

Beast Boy and that other guy whose name I still don't know hadn't come back yet. It had been awhile now, and I was starting to worry about them. Ara kept trying to sleep, and for now, I let her. I gently rocked her back and forth in my arms, letting her listen to my heartbeat. In the thick darkness, it was hard to tell whether or not she was actually asleep. That's why I kept on rocking her; that, and I needed to try to calm down a little.

Beast Boy had to succeed in losing Slade to the forest. If he didn't, Slade would take the baby. And he knew what would happen if my baby were to be taken from me before adulthood. Come to think of it, I don't believe I told him about the terms of adulthood for Azurans. The true meaning of it is when the child is old enough to have babies. Even then, the mothers take care of it, though. It's just that if the child is taken when or after it reaches adulthood, the mom won't go all psycho trying to search for him or her. The mother would be able to remain calm and collected.

A fly kept pestering me, making it hard not to let go of Ara for just a second and slapping it away. That stupid annoying buzzing sound and the way it kept crawling on me... Downright irritating.

I heard a faint roar in the distance. I couldn't make out if it was a roar of pain, attack, defeat, or victory. I really hoped it was victory.

Seconds later, that same little fly that kept bugging me morphed into a human, making me jump and making Ara wake up and start crying again. He was like Beast Boy except in a light-brown color and slightly taller. Basically, it was that other guy.

"What are you doing here? Where's Beast Boy?" I demanded an answer.

"Relax, Miss. Garfield sent me here to protect you in case that armored man came after you," he replied.

"Wait, so he's still out there?"

"No, that roar you heard was him telling me he drove the man away."

I relaxed a bit. "Okay, well then why were you annoying me when you were a fly?"

He grinned sheepishly and said, "Actually I never meant to annoy you. I just wanted you to know I was there. It would have been much more surprising had I morphed out of nowhere."

...Well, I couldn't really combat that. And if he had walked up to me as a human, I wouldn't see him clearly enough to know he wasn't Slade and I would have run away from him.

A giant figure appeared in the near distance. It was an unmistakable figure of a T-Rex. I knew that had to be _my_ changeling. After just a quick glance, the dinosaur disappeared and a wolf walked up to me, licking my face.

"Hey, you're okay!" I stated.

The wolf sniffed Ara, I assumed to make sure she was unharmed. Then Beast Boy changed back into his default human self. He had some cuts and scratches here and there, but he looked like he was fine.

"Hey, Raven. You okay?" He asked me, but I knew he already knew the answer.

"I'm fine, so's Ara."

"What about you, Rudy?" He turned to the other guy whose name I just found out.

"I'm okay. Say, who was that man anyway? And why exactly were we attacking him?" Rudy asked.

Before Beast Boy could answer him, I beat him to the punch. "That was Slade. He's a horrible man who wants to take and raise Ara to be his apprentice. If that happens, she'll grow up to be one of the bad guys, and people will treat her like an enemy."

Rudy paused to let it sink in. "So then how does he know you? She's your baby, but what does he want with her?"

"He knows me because he's the father. He wants Ara because he believes she may have inherited my powers."

"You have powers?"

I nodded. "But I can't use them right now. I won't be able to until Ara's at least a year old."

I was shocked when neither of them said anything. I figured Beast Boy, of all of us, would say something, but he didn't. Instead he seemed to be deep in thought. And the thought seemed to disturb him.

"I think Slade might come back," he pointed out. He looked at me. I knew Slade would come back for me; there was no doubt about that. But I didn't speak to him only because he looked like he was trying to tell me something.

Rudy was also interested in what his friend had to say.

"We just barely held him off long enough for you to get out safely. I think I managed to run him off by sheer luck. In fact, it's safe to say he probably retreated on his own. Raven, I'm not sure how safe you are with just us to protect you and Ara. I hate saying this, but we need some more help," he explained.

He acted like I was supposed to get what he meant, but I was so exhausted I hadn't the slightest clue what he was getting at. So I simply gave him a confused look, telling him to get to the point.

He hissed at himself and ran his fingers through his hair, his body language signaling to me that I wasn't going to like what he had to say.

"I think we need to go back, Rae."

"Back to where?" I asked through a deep yawn.

He hesitated. I could guarantee he was wondering whether or not it was worth telling me about. If I wouldn't like it, then right now, I probably didn't want to hear it. I was mentally and physically drained. I didn't want bad news, I just wanted to sleep.

"Raven, this choice is entirely up to you and you alone. Do you want to go back to Jump City and ask for _their_ help?"

Even though he tried to say it as calmly and gently as possible, it still hit me like a ton of bricks. Me? Jump City? The Titans? No, no! It was completely out of the question! How could Beast Boy even ask me that?

"Please, Rae, it's up to you but I'm begging you to say yes. We could really use Starfire's help right now, don't you think? I bet she really misses you."

"She turned her back on me!"

"Yeah, but she said something about her culture, too."

"They _all_ turned their backs on me!"

"...I didn't," he said flatly.

Well, no, he hadn't. But everyone else had. I would never forget the words Robin said to me before I left. His last words to me, and they were burned into my memory forever. There was no way Robin would ever have forgiven me. Not now, and I'm pretty sure not ever. Plus, if I were to go back, what would happen to Ara? I already knew how I would be treated there, but her? She'd have ten times worse. And that's if she was lucky.

"Beast Boy, do you remember what Robin said to me the day I left?"

"How could I forget?" he answered.

"Now think about this for a second. If I went back, I would have to bring Ara with me. Seeing how I was treated, what do you think will happen to her?"

"Ah, excuse me, but," Rudy's voice chimed in, "why are you so reluctant to go back?"

"Rudy, stay out of this. No offense but this is complicated right now," Beast Boy said.

Rudy put his hands up in defense and stayed silent.

Beast Boy turned his attention back to me and continued, "Raven, Rudy and I can't do this by ourselves. You _know_ how powerful Slade is. He's tricky, elusive, cunning, strong, and he's usually five steps ahead of us. Even tonight, he knew we were with you. At this rate, it won't be long until you lose Ara. No matter how hard we try, we can't do this alone, and you don't have your powers. If you won't do this for me, do this for Ara."

I stood up and looked him square in the eye, frustrated and angry. He was right, I had no choice but to turn to the remainder of the Titans for assistance. For Ara's sake if not the world's, I had to do this. I had to face those who I once thought were my friends.

I couldn't bring myself to say yes. I was choked up from the stress of it all. Tears were already brimming at the thought of going back just to be harrassed about my baby. But Ara needed to be protected; she couldn't grow up to be like Slade.

This had to be my first real trial as a new mother. I had to put my newborn's best interests above my own. If what Beast Boy said was true, if he couldn't protect us even with Rudy's help, then the Teen Titans were the only other option.

As much as I wanted to scream and tell him he _could_ do it, I didn't. I knew he couldn't and I knew I couldn't lie to him. Besides, right now this wasn't about me, this was about Ara's safety. Yes, Slade would raise her if he got his hands on her, but he would teach her to kill. To slaughter. To maim. To brutally murder someone just for nefarious causes. Preventing that was my duty as her mother. I couldn't let my daughter grow up without knowing joy or happiness or love.

I turned around and walked toward the direction I assumed was was way we got here. I think it was the right direction, because Beast Boy was quick to point something out to me.

"No, Raven. The police are still after you. We need to get to the peak of the mountain so we can tell where we're going."

"But if Slade retreated, he probably went up the mountain, too. Plus, if some hungry animal or poisonous spider gets past you, I won't have the protection of my powers or Jenka to fend it off," I argued.

This made him reconsider. I guess after a few moments of thought, he remembered how reluctant I was to go back. He remembered how I never wanted to return, even after Ara was born. He knew how, even to this day, I still felt the same.

And he was right to think that. I had been harboring a hatred or either their actions or them for quite some time. I wanted to be comforted right now, but nobody seemed to grasp that. I wanted badly to take out my frustration at the situation I'd put everyone in. But if I did, the rest of my dignity would be lost. It would be convenient if Robin were a punching bag.

...

But even if that were the case, would I be able to look him in the eye? Deep inside I knew the answer. After what he said to me... After I saved his life... After I went through Hell's fires for all of them...

No, no, it wasn't their fault! It was mine! I had a choice! I did this to myself. I became Slade's little slut. I became pregnant. I chose to leave. I dragged Beast Boy into this. I deserved what they said. I deserved to be rejected. I was the one who made Robin wish I was dead.

I sniffled and wiped away tears that I hadn't even known were there.

This was all my fault... Me, Slade's slut. Why couldn't I have been raped instead? Yeah it would hurt, but at least then I would still be at Titans' Tower. I missed that huge T-shaped building. I really wanted my old life back. I wanted my friends back.

Was what I did the right way to go?

"Raven," Beast Boy mumbled. "It's not your fault."

"I had a choice... I know this could've been handled differently..." I replied nostalgically.

Beast Boy shook his head, trying to prove me wrong. "This is Slade's doing."

"But I played along."

"Because you were doing the right thing. You saved four lives, including mine."

"Only because I didn't think of a different approach in time."

"Because there wasn't much time to begin with."

I gave up by staying quiet. I knew telling him I was just another slut would enrage him. His anger was the last thing I needed right now.

I started off down the mountain, knowing that if we retraced our steps, it would take a few months to get back. I wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible.


	25. Back to Jump City

-Chapter 25-

The Teen Titans, or what was left of them, handed out the last poster of the day. It was on the northern edge of Jump City. So far, nobody had seen Raven. They had figured they would find her in about a week or so, but they'd been searching for how long now...? Plus, with all the crime in the city, stopping the villains interfered with their search. Raven had always been secretive and mysterious, but finding her was proving to be impossible. And who could blame them? They had already thoroghly searched the nearest six cities!

"Knowing Raven, she's probably halfway around the world right now," Cyborg said as he drove his other two friends back to Titans' Tower.

"I do not think friend Raven is coming back," Starfire admitted. She stared out the window, wondering where Raven could be.

"Most people lose their wallets or their cell phones. No, we managed to lose two people!" Cyborg said sarcastically.

As the high-tech car continued down the road to reach its first intersection, an object seemed to pop out of nowhere. It flew in a surprisingly striaght line only to smash through the wall of a building up ahead.

Cyborg slammed on the brakes, causing everyone in it to be choked by the seatbelts. After the car stopped, everyone was thrown back into their seats.

"Cyborg, what was that all about? You almost killed us!" Robin reprimanded him.

"Look at that!" Cyborg pointed to the front of the windshield at the debree cloud puffing up from where the wall had been smashed.

An enormous brown T-Rex's head could be seen peeking out from the building it had been hiding behind. The large beast roared at the debree cloud.

"Is that friend Beast Boy?" Starfire asked hopefully.

"No, Beast Boy is green. That looks like a real T-Rex," the martial artist stated.

After the T-Rex had come into full view, it lowered its head and rumbled deeply, threateningly, at whatever was in the wall.

A green cheetah with darker green spots, much smaller than the dinosaur, flew by the damaged building in an effort to escape whatever the T-Rex was fighting. It seemed to be carrying something blue on its back, but that could've been an illusion because of the large cat's speed. There had only been a glimpse of it before it was gone.

Meanwhile, the large dinosaur lifted one clawed hind leg and brought it down on the already broken wall. Thankfully the building was empty...for some unknown reason.

There was a flash of silver, then a person landed on the top of the nearly-destroyed building.

"Slade!" Robin gasped from inside the car.

That meant the dinosaur was their side...or its own, whichever.

The T-Rex angrily roared at Slade, but he didn't seem to acknowledge jumped off the top of the building and ran in the direction the cheetah had gone.

Cyborg waited until the dinosaur had started chasing after him to step on the gas and follow.

They only needed to get around five miles to see Slade running after a different animal in front of him. It was the cheetah, and it seemed to be wearing a blue cape.

The T-rex seemed to have gone missing. Instead there was a brown bird flying overhead, keeping a suspicious eye on the Titans' car.

Slade kept up the higher grounds, leaping effortlessly from rooftop to rooftop. And he was starting to gain on the green cheetah.

The remainder of the Titans couldn't believe what they were seeing. They hadn't seen Beast Boy in so long; he quit the team. In their minds, they were debating whether that was Beast Boy or a radioactive cheetah.

The bird flew directly over Slade before morphing into an elephant. Its goal was to land on Slade, but Slade jumped down from the roof and began running on the road. The elephant became a bird once more and followed.

"How is there a second shapeshifter?" Robin asked, knowing no one knew the answer.

Slade, out of range of the bird's attacks, pulled out three bombs and threw them at the cheetah. His aim was very precise, and although the cheetah managed to dodge two of them, the third hit without fail. The large cat was thrown farther ahead in the road, behind the smoke the bomb left behind.

_**~Raven's POV~**_

Beast Boy landed on his feet, thankfully being a feline. I had been bumped around a bit, but I was unharmed.

He let me off and morphed into a human, only long enough to tell me to run as far away as I could. I nodded and didn't hesitate.

Beast Boy changed into a bear and lumbered back into the smoke cloud to help Rudy. Hopefully we weren't too far from Titans' Tower. Well, hopefully and not hopefully for me. I still didn't want to go.

_**Normal POV**_

Out of the smoke cloud came a green bear, and it wasn't wearing a blue cape anymore.

"It is Beast Boy!" the alien princess declared.

Cyborg lowered the window and stuck out his canon-arm. When it was fully charged, he shot at Slade. It hit. Slade hadn't expected an attack from behind since he was still out of the bird's aerial attack range.

When the Titans saw Slade fall down, even though he got back up afterwards, they roared their achievement in the car, with Cyborg making sassy remarks.

"Hold on," Robin said, interrupting their small celebration. "When Beast Boy passed by as a cheetah, I could've sworn he was wearing a blue cape. He looks pretty tickeed off at Slade. And the blue cape might have been Raven's. I think something's happened to her."

Starfire gasped in horror. "Robin, do not say such things!"

"He's right, Star. I think Slade did something to Raven, and whatever it was, it made Beast Boy angry," Cyborg said.

The huge bear was now facing Slade and trying to strike him down with his claws. t wasn't working. He had only been hit twice, but they were hardly even scratches.

The other changeling finally caught up to his friend. He landed before transforming into a velocoraptor. He tried to scratch and bite him, but it didn't work much against Slade's steel armor.

Seeing as how little their abilites were doing for them, they both morphed into rhinos and began forcing Slade backward.

"Is it just me, or does it look like they aren't actually trying to win?" Cyborg asked.

"Why do they not try to beat Slade?" Starfire asked.

"I'm not sure. I don't think they were ever fighting him to begin with... But why?" Robin was also questioning their motives for what looked like quitting.

The brown rhinocerous bellowed at Beast Boy. Beast Boy belowed back. They pushed Slade a little further, then shapeshifted into cheetahs to rush away as quickly as possible. Slade threw two bombs, but they both missed.

"Mark my words, I _will_ have my apprentice," he muttered after them.

After an eternity of chasing them down, Cyborg stopped the car a few yards away from the armored man and three of the Teen Titans got out of the car. Cyborg readied his canon...he had a few questions he wanted to ask first.

"Alright, talk. Why didn't they even try to fight?" Cyborg asked.

"And what have you done with Raven?" Starefire also had questions. In fact, they all did. Robin, however, wanted to stay focused. He didn't ask his question.

"They didn't fight because they were just stalling me," Slade answered vaguely. With that he jumped on the rooftop and headed in the direction Beast Boy and the other changeling went.

Starfire started to follow after him, but stopped when he disappeared.

"Titans," Robin pointed towards the direction Slade went. "Let's go."

Instead of getting back in the car, they ran after Slade, keeping a close eye on him. He seemed to run mainly in the same direction, save for a few turns here and there.

**_~Raven's POV~_**

Beast Boy frantically banged on the door of the tower. "Starfire! Cyborg! Robin! Let us in! IT'S IMPORTANT!"

I was hiding behind a tree, frozen stiff. Ara was calm in my arms. She would be getting hungry soon, though. I would have to get her inside to let her nurse, but I was so nervous and scared. A mixture of emotions, really.

Even now, I still couldn't believe how many run-ins we've had with Slade. They were all dangerous fights, but Beast Boy and Rudy had learned it was all the wiser to stall him until they figured I was far enough away. No matter how many times we lost him, he found us again and again. He literally followed us to Jump City. He would do whatever it took to get Ara; I understood that now. The two changelings seemed to know it as well because instead of just trying to protect Ara, they were trying even moreso to protect me. If I was safe, Ara was safe.

As Beast Boy was begging to be let in, Rudy kept a viligant eye out for any signs of trouble. He had a great aerial view as a hawk, but he couldn't fly up too high. If he did and something happened, he wouldn't be able to get down on land soon enough. So he only flew up about fifteen feet and kept circling there.

Ara stretched and yawned. Already jumpy and tense, I almost dropped her. She got startled by this and in turn she woke up crying.

Immediately, Beast Boy rushed over to see what was going on.

It was adorable how much and how often he worried about Ara even though she wasn't born to him.

"It's okay, she's just woken up. She's probably hungry now," I told him.

Beast Boy nodded quickly and began trying to explain to the door of the tower the situation we were in. Nobody answered us, though.

"Kreeeeee! Kreee'eee!" Rudy screamed from the sky.

"Highly unlikely, Rudy!" Beast Boy yelled up to him.

I was relieved when Beast Boy said that. I thought Rudy was shouting an alarm call to us. If it were danger, Beast Boy would never have said what he did.

I relaxed only at the fact that there was no threat to me or my baby. But I was still a wreck over coming here. I was halfheartedly hoping they weren't home. The other half of me was staying only for the sake of Ara. But if not for Ara, I would never have come back here. I knew I wouldn't because I didn't want to go through the same thing.

"Kak kak kak kak!"

"Can it, Rudy!" Beast Boy shouted back. It was then I assumed Rudy had either been making fun of him or laughing at him.

"Kakah..."

I stayed behind my tree trying to get Ara back to sleep. Having a screaming baby in your arms while a bad guy is after you isn't the luckiest nor the most convenient thing in the world.

Beast Boy transformed into a hummingbird and flew up to the first floor of the tower, looking in each of the windows and searching each of the rooms thoroughly before moving up a floor. In a matter of minutes he was done.

"I can't see them. They might be in the basement training if they're in there," he said once he was human again. "I guess we'll just have to w-"

"Kra'eeee! Kra'eeee!" Rudy screeched.

"Raven, get out of here," Beast Boy whispered as Rudy landed.

He morphed into a tiger, while Rudy morphed into a python. The plan was for Beast Boy to hold Slade down long enough while Rudy wrapped around him and tightened, forming a living rope. Rudy would then hold Slade for as long as possible, with his friend sticking around for backup if needed, while Raven made her escape. If Rudy could hold long enough, Raven would be safe. But the longer he held on, the safer Raven would be. The only setback was that this took quite an amount of strength to contain someone like Slade, someone who never seemed to tire out. The longer Rudy held him back, the more effort it took. And the more effort it took, the more energy it took. Eventually Rudy would have to let go. And as soon as he did, Beast Boy, who would have morphed into a large bird, would carry Rudy away so they could find Raven. The plan seemed flawless, but if Rudy couldn't hold on long enough, then it could mean the end for me and Ara.

**I will not abandon this story. (even if it happens to take me forever to update... -.-") Hope you liked it! And keep reading because this story's almost done.**

**Thanks,  
CrypticMoonFang**


	26. Finding Raven

-Chapter 26-

The footsteps of the enemy could be heard approaching, and Beast Boy and Rudy got into a hiding position, ready to pounce at any given moment. They would have to jump Slade at just the right time, if not he could likely get away.

Beast Boy had the hardest job in this plan. Tackling an enemy like Slade and then having to hold him down long enough for Rudy to tighten around him was going to be extremely hard work.

Both the changelings hidden, they carefully scanned the landscape form which the footsteps could be heard.

It only took moments before Beast Boy pounced. But he pounced the wrong person.

Rudy was on his way, but stopped short when his green friend rumbled at him. He hissed back, only to be rewarded with another low growl. It was then that both shapeshifters morphed into their human forms so they could speak with their victim of a near-heart attack.

"It's okay, Rudy. These were the guys we were looking for," Beast Boy told his childhood friend.

"So I see," Rudy replied.

Cyborg got up off the ground and smiled, happy to know his former teammate and friend was okay.

"Sorry about that, Cyborg. Rudy and I had this plan, see, and we thought you were Slade," Beast Boy explained.

"It is all well with Cyborg. But you must be devastated! We are very sorry..." Starfire mumbled sadly.

"What do you mean?"

Robin put a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder. "It was Slade's fault, wasn't it?"

What were they talking about? Unless they meant a small portion of the city getting destroyed and them having to come back to Titans' Tower for help, then nothing was really Slade's fault. Or maybe they were becoming psychotic... Or maybe they had had a dream and gotten it confused with reality. Well, no, that couldn't be it... They couldn't have all had the same dream...right? Oh! Maybe they meant Rudy! They hadn't met him yet, Beast Boy mused.

**Aren't you forgetting something?** a familiar voice asked.

"Egh...I don't have time for you!" Beast Boy shouted, startling the Titans.

**_~Raven's POV~_**

I kept running, Ara safely in my arms. She was screaming. She was hungry. I wanted to feed her, if not just to stop her fussing. Yes, she was a baby, but that didn't change the fact that her noise-making could jeopardize my life and her future. Slade's appearances had finally taken a toll on my body. I still hadn't been able to completely recover from giving birth. Between avoiding wild animals, running from Slade, eluding the cops, tending to Ara, and traveling to Jump City, I had very little time to rest.

However, Beast Boy and Rudy also didn't have that luxury. They were deteriorating at the same pace I was. Especially since they were the ones who held off a very strong villain until I could reach safety.

Looking back on everything, it had been a hard life for us so far. I completely understood why they needed the Titans' help. My feelings toward this idea hadn't changed, but my analysis had. With Slade around, the situation was dire. His very presence staked the entire world. I was also useless to Beast Boy and Rudy and completely vulnerable to anything Slade had to throw my way.

Eventually, I gauged it was the right time to stop running and catch my breath. Ara was still screaming, still hungry. My maternal instincts were screaming at me to hurry and feed her. But my mind? It knew better. It knew Slade was at large and it knew I couldn't afford to feed my baby just yet. I had no choice but to wait for Beast Boy to trail my scent. My scent would lead him straight to me and he could track where I had been. Rudy would always be right with him. They did their best to protect me, but it was scary that their best just wasn't enough.

I leaned against a tree, not trusting myself to sit down. I was utterly exhausted. If I sat down even for a minute, I might fall asleep. Under no circumstances could I allow that to happen.

...But at this point, my eyes wouldn't even open all the way. They stayed halfway shut. I had bags under them. Overall, I was completely wiped out. It was so tempting to take a nap, and it would be so easy to just sit against the tree and shut my eyes for a few moments. It was a nice thought to rest my weary body.

I yawned, but tried to stay alert. I definitely did not fall asleep.

My many encounters with Slade had taught me a valuable detail about him. He loved to attack from the high grounds. He was able to be sneakier that way and he could be silent, less suspicious. From the trees was even more dangerous; he could hide in the shadows. And while his armor reflected light, it also was able to camouflage him in the darkness. Broad daylight and nighttime...he could appear at any place, at any time.

I tried to shush Ara and get her back to sleep. She wouldn't have it. She was hungry and she would make sure I got the point one way or another. She started screaming louder.

"Please, please, Beast Boy... You have to hurry..." I murmured.

Our encounters with Slade had also taught us another crucial fact about him. If you stayed in one place, he _would_ find you. I could hardly even walk anymore, let alone run. But I kept moving for the sake of my baby.

My chest was heaving up and down, my eyes and limbs were heavy. I had to wait for Beast Boy or Rudy; either one would do now.

Slade's little slut...those were the words Robin had said to me. Those were the words I would have to live by from now on.

_**Normal POV**_

"So, what are you sorry about exactly?" Rudy was asking.

Starfire felt the need to give her friend's friend an answer, though nobody really wanted to mention it or bring it up in front of Beast Boy. She decided she had to be the first to do it since no one else would.

"We are sorry," she said, "for the loss of Raven..."

**And so I ask you again, aren't you forgetting something?** the voice teased.

"Oh, man... C'mon, Rudy!" With that, Beast Boy and Rudy shifted from human to wolf and began running after Raven's scent.

Being wolves, it only took about ten minutes to get to her. The Titans had yet to reach this point; none of them had kept up with the humanimals.

Beast Boy howled, alerting Raven to his presence. Rudy howled along with his friend, to let the empath know he was there, too.

The cloaked girl gingerly stepped out from behind a tree about six feet away from her protectors. She really hadn't needed to hide; Ara's screaming had literally _just_ died down when her mother had finally managed to get her back to sleep. She looked tiredly up at her boyfriend and cracked a smile of victory for accomplishing the feat of calming Ara.

"Raven, it was a false alarm. I tackled Cyborg, not Slade. They're on their way right now," Beast Boy told her after he had morphed back into a human.

"Can't you just tell them to beat Slade and leave me alone?"

"No, they think you're dead."

"That's even better."

"Raven, now is the absolute worst time possible to be difficult. We don't have any other choice and you know it. Rudy and I just can't keep doing this, Raven. There's never any time to rest, and we're tiring out. The Titans, or what's left of them, have had plenty of rest. They have a far better chance than we do."

Raven knew their condition. It was better than her own only because she had gone through the whole birthing process. Her defenders seemed to know this, too, and patiently waited for her when she fell behind. But now she wanted to get ahead of them, not fall behind. She wanted to run away. Raven just wasn't ready to face them yet. Especially given what her former leader and friend had said to her...

Beast Boy turned to Rudy. "Go get the rest; I'll stay with Raven."

Still a wolf, Rudy barked and walked off in the exact direction they had just come from. He knew one of them, at the very least, had to stay with the empath to make sure Slade couldn't get her. But Beast Boy was right...they couldn't keep this up forever, and it didn't sound too much like Slade was willing to surrender his daughter anytime soon.

**_~Rudy's POV~_**

I knew I didn't have to run to find Beast Boy's friends. I could already smell them, all three of them. Thankfully for me they had decided not to split up looking for us.

As I drew ever closer to them, I worried for Raven. I still didn't know the details, but I knew they had done something to make Raven snap. Even as a human, I could sense this. She was radiating her emotions loud and clear, even though she tried to keep them under control.

With the break of a small fallen branch, I looked up from the ground. It was a red-haired girl and her friends. This was them, those who my friend had been talking about. They could help us.

I barked, alerting them to my presence, and pointed my nose in the opposing direction, the direction Raven and Beast Boy were in. I barked again, just to make sure they got the point.

"This looks like Beast Boy's companion. Surely he must want us to follow," the red-haired teen observed. I kind of liked her, she seemed to understand exactly what I was trying to get them to do. Too bad morphing into a human to communicate better never occurred to me...

I barked, telling her she was correct.

"I think you're right, Star. Either that, or this is a real wolf," a half-human, half-robot said.

I whined and shook my fur. That was so not right.

"A wolf in the city? That's funny, Cyborg. Let's just follow him." I knew this guy, the boy who was once partnered with Batman. I never actually admired him, though most people did.

I took a few steps forward and looked back, my puppy-dog face pleading them to come with me. Seriously, though, why didn't I just turn back into a human? Then I could just _tell_ them to follow me.

"Very well, member of the canine family, we shall follow you and allow you to lead us to where you want us to go," the red-haired girl told me.

I barked a thank-you and began walking, looking back every now and then to make sure they hadn't fallen behind and were still following me. Taking them to Raven was important, I knew, but still... She would hate seeing them. What had they done to her? They seemed friendly enough to me, but...maybe I was wrong. Maybe they were terrible people whom Raven had gotten involved with. Perhaps Slade had once been a former member of this group. Nevertheless, I remained calm and tried to show no actions that resembled aggression. Baring fangs would be aggressive, but it sometimes meant something was caught in our teeth, and it sometimes meant we were holding back a sneeze or yawn.

I howled to Beast Boy, letting him know I had found his friends and was currently en route with them in tow.

**_~Raven's POV~_**

"Rudy found them, didn't he?" I asked, more of a statement than a question.

"Looks like," Beast Boy replied softly. "You going to be okay with them around?"

I didn't respond, I didn't even nod or shake my head. I just looked down at a sleeping Ara. Hopefully she would stay asleep while we explained what our situation was and why we needed their help.

I heard footsteps crushing the leaves on the ground. The worst part was, I didn't even need to look up to know they were there.

**A/N**

**Reviews would be much appreciated. You don't have to, I'm just saying. I will still update this story even if you choose not to review.**


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